Chapter 2 - Specialists in Plain Sight
New York, US
When Saturday finally came around, Sirius was already up at 7 that morning. He wasn't particularly a very good lark, though he did try to seem like one. In the lukewarm rain of his apartment's shower, he once again had himself under pressure of the uneasiness of what he'd meet in the place where he was supposed to go. He was caught between the indecisiveness of going and not going, but after putting up airs a couple days back he felt that it wouldn't be fair to back down on his words. After all, Honoka was already expecting him to come around her and Hikari's place this morning in order to borrow her car.
The cold morning atmosphere was shaking the fibers of his muscles the second he walked out of the shower. Sirius could see the way his breathing hitched and shivered when he stood in front of the bathroom mirror. Two-three seconds was all it took for the reflection of the indigo-haired man to start swallowing the real him into a nostalgic abyss; have he really changed that much in 10 years?
Sirius took note of himself with a careful eye, like a painter taking note of his half-finished canvas in frustration. A towel was wrapped around his waist, but everything from the navel above was in full view to be reflected upon the clear glass surface; his many scars, his fading burn wounds not just from the fight a few nights ago, the way his muscles shaped his history.
"Many people are expecting you and your return, Mr. Wilsk."
Sirius felt his heart ache, the same way one would feel reuniting with friends and acquaintances whom you have grown exiled from. What would they probably say when they see him the way he was, while expecting the man he was not? Washed up? Failure?
"No. Stop that," Sirius shut his inner voice up, "Your friends wouldn't say that. People who knew you wouldn't say that. Origami lies. You have no friends. Nobody is waiting for you… Not anymore…"
He leaned forward on the bathroom sink, keeping his body steady with his hands as support. The reflection in the mirror lowered its gaze, and Sirius lowered his too. As if conversing, an unspoken promise was exchanged between the two of them: we must get to the bottom of this.
After a quick bite of something he bought at the store the night before; one pack of convenience store bread and a box of milk coffee for energy, Sirius left his flat for a short walk towards the suburbs.
But when he finally found himself at the sidewalk in front of the residence of his teacher, Honoka was already waiting for him while sitting at her house's patio, and—guessing from how she hadn't changed from her satin pajamas as if woken up in a hurry—she didn't seem to be too pleased at seeing Sirius this early in the morning on a Saturday.
"If you smell something fishy, run away or call me immediately. You don't have your weapons on you anymore," Honoka's voice reprimanded him once the two of them were at her driveway, her car keys dangling in front of him like a piece of dog treat Sirius hadn't earned to eat.
"Yes," The man could only respond meekly.
"Don't put your phone on silent."
"Yes."
"Have you had breakfast?"
"I have."
"Okay. Keep me updated when you're done," Honoka then tossed him the keys, "Try not to wake Hikari when you drive off."
"Yes, thank you."
She left, and Sirius was now in the company of her black sedan that she prepared outside on her driveway just before he arrived. The man didn't plan on idling around on her property any longer than necessary, lest he wanted her to see the anxiousness he had about today.
After making sure not to blast the engine alive, Sirius drove away from the neighborhood. The piece of paper Origami had left him with a few days ago was sitting just in front of the speedometer, clueing him on where he should go.
He gripped his steering wheel tightly, bracing himself to face whoever was waiting for him at the end of the road, and he kept driving.
"3 years was the time it took to develop a vaccine to counter metamorphosis."
The outline of a woman silhouetted the light of the projector.
"The reverse-trigger drugs, most commonly the ones produced by big pharma companies like Euclidean Pharmaceuticals, or Shanghai-shi Medicine, are the drugs we can find easily anywhere in the world. Someone takes it, it weakens their Quirk, makes them practically Quirkless. Simple. But it's not a perfect cure. It cannot deal with the Singularity risk most threatening to corporate assets; Chrysalis' and Imagos."
The silhouette of the woman then turned towards the screen projected on the hanging sheet of vinyl. The shuffling of her heeled shoes echoed throughout the room.
"Among the 193 countries in the world, America belongs to the two-thirds of which did not create mandates that encourage state-wide use of the vaccine. Initially during the Great Singularity Crisis, a nationwide mandate was proposed to make the use of the vaccines mandatory, but since we are a country that honors liberty and freedom values above all else, the proposal would of course be met with a large disagreement.
The aim of this response team is to act as a solution to the problem that stemmed from that decision. By employing people who are able to deal with Chrysalis and Imago Singularities directly, led under an independent sector rather than a governmental one, the response towards Singularity related incidents would be met with little to no limitations from the law.
Imagine, a private owned organization specialized in dealing with Singularity risks across the nation without having to be pressured maximally by central, and at the palm of your hands as a service you can commission at any time."
The silhouette of the woman turned to face her audience. In the dim lit room across from her were several suited men sitting in the darkness—powerful men, chairmen, circling a large wooden table. One particular man near the front spoke up, he was an youthful man with a well-trimmed beard.
"So something like the experimental response team during the Crisis, eh? Interesting…"
Though not everyone shared his enthusiastic sentiment.
"Don't forget what happened to the old Task Force," Another suited man responded from behind, he was a man in rounded glasses, "Not even the new president wants to bring up that can of worms."
The other men in the room nodded in agreement with him. Another man across the first one, an oriental man with anomalous elongated ears, also chided in to add something to the conversation.
"Where would you even find the people for this project? There's so little of Quirk users who could directly hurt Singularities these days you might as well just be better off relying on the heroes."
But the woman who stood in front of them kept her calm demeanor, like she had been asked the same questions time and time again, "That is a correct assessment, Mr. Chairman. Which is why just using the advantages of an all-human specialist team won't be enough to fight Imagos or Chrysalis."
The woman turned to the picture projected behind her. With a light click on the remote controller device that she had with her from the beginning, the image changed.
"My project aims to include the power of benevolent Singularities as well."
The men in the room started murmuring to each other in disbelief; some were chuckling at the absurdity of the prospect, others out of what sounded to be genuine interest. It seemed that her statement along with the pictures that changed in a slideshow before them was enough to get them to question the validity of the speaker's claims.
"You're… planning on using Living Quirks to fight Living Quirks?"
"Is that even possible?"
"A Singularity's innate nigh-invincibility can be nullified by attacks of its own kind, you see. When another Singularity tries to occupy the same space with intent to kill, both of them will try to cancel each other out. It's a common phenomenon in nature in which cells will try to reject other cells they find as foreign," The woman figure explained, "Nobody's ever tried this method before, as it is impossible to reign a Living Quirk with a leash to do one's bidding… until now."
The room became silent. The pressure of the darkness started to tense their nerves. One bowtied man at the back of the table then broke the silence, "And… how do you plan on creating these, umm, benevolent Singularities? It sounds like a lot of risk."
The speaker smiled, "You may say that it is one of the good things that has come out of a decade of living in fear of Singularities. Eventually, there will be something to feed on the apex predator."
She started chuckling to herself in the darkness, letting the other occupants just stare at the shake of her silhouette's shoulders.
"The roster of my experimental team will not be of any of your concern, gentlemen. Take comfort in the fact that all tests regarding the effectiveness of this team have been done years prior to this meeting, which I'm sure you are all already aware of."
None of the audience responded to that, letting the woman's presence continue dominating the meeting. With her two hands, the woman on the front leaned forward upon the table, until her face removed itself from the brightness of the projector, and into the shade of darkness. Two large glinting things on top of where both her eyes were supposed to be revealed themselves, like an ever present all-seeing gaze of an owl.
"All you need to know is that once I'm voted into congress it won't take us 3 years to turn the risk of Singularities harming your assets, into just memories of risks. Rest assured, your interests are my interests."
Before the meeting could enter its conclusion, a final condescending voice from the audience spoke up. "Come on, she's obviously scamming us. We pay her and then what, it turns out what we get is another botched science fair experiment like they did during the Crisis? I'm not gonna waste my money on protection that doesn't exist."
"Chairman…" Another well-dressed audience member chided him in worry.
"I want you to bring me one, right now," The chairman declared, laughing egotistically as he did. Though his face was obscured in the darkness, his demands were clear as day, "A benevolent Living Quirk. And I don't mean bring me photos, or videos, put one into this room right now with us."
The entire table burst into debates. Some burst into laughter, seemingly amused at the prospect.
"Are you mad?"
"He's right, it's the only way we could confirm one."
"Haha! How do you plan to respond to that, Stane?"
"Gentlemen," The female speaker said aloud, clapping her hands as she did to completely drown out the other noises in the room, "I understand Chairman Diaz's skepticism, and I would be happy to prove my claims. Yes… I would be happy to bring one of my specialists into this room as you wish. It is no trouble at all!"
All eyes were looking at her from the darkness with high expectations. Then, out of nowhere, a knocking sound. From outside the room, behind the wooden double-doors that was hidden in the darkness across from the giant table, someone was requesting entry.
A small smile crept from the edge of her lips.
"For I am well prepared for everything."
It was quite the long drive to the location, as Sirius himself personally wasn't someone who could stand long travels, but he was more occupied with where he had found himself in, rather than the time spent getting there. In front of him was very clearly a skyscraper, located in what he was familiar with as New York's financial district. Postmodern architecture surrounded him like a labyrinth, a mixture of asymmetrical geometry and pristine concrete-like material towering over him with wide windows like eyes, reminding him of period adverts that described the idealistic future town.
Sirius parked just at the feet of the building, near the short jog up a small flight of stairs that lead to the entrance. He was met with the sight of the large interior of the lobby room, and he wasn't even inside yet. Sirius was glad that wearing his business attire and a matching overcoat to go with it became a habit at his job, or else he'd feel out of place otherwise.
He didn't waste time entering the establishment once he locked the door to his car. Taking a brisk walk past the pristine yet seemingly empty lobby—save for a few of the building staff such as the receptionist, the janitor, and the occasional security guards, Sirius reached the end of the ground floor where a handful of elevators face each other from wall to wall. He took a quick glance at the "At the events of fire and Singularity attacks, do not use the elevator" sign, before proceeding to reach the idle touchpad elevator panel.
"This way, Mr. Wilsk."
Sirius turned his head so fast, he almost had a whiplash. He realized that he was too high-strung, that even a familiar voice he could never forget made him jump too quick.
Behind him, leaning into the elevator panel across from his, was the face-shifter. They wore the exact same feminine face Sirius saw them change into after the both of them were almost killed by a Chrysalis that one day.
The impostor grinned at him, before simply pointing their thumb past their shoulder, to the metal elevator doors behind them that just somehow suddenly opened up at the gesture, "Fancy a talk?"
Sirius, now flooded with memories of what the imposter had done to him and Hikari, brushed him off and continued to face the elevator on his side of the wall.
"No thanks," Sirius simply said, "But I'll talk to your boss, if that's fine."
"That's fine," The face-shifter said, almost yawning, "It's not like you know where she is in this high-rise…"
He didn't. "I'll find her."
"Look," Footsteps approached him. Sirius suddenly was aware that Origami had distinctly heavy steps, "You want to know how I know about you, right?"
The specialist glanced past his shoulder, and saw Origami still grinning at him, just closer now.
"I'll tell you, trust me," Whatever made Origami so talented at making their tone just so finely vague, enough that it sounded both serious and teasing, was lost on the specialist, "Let's have a chat about that, while I lead you to her."
At first, Sirius didn't respond.
"Look, no guns," Origami lifted the outer layer of their three piece suit, showing the androgynous form they sported under an expensive black ensemble, as well as the lack of armaments that they had, "No swords, no tricks, no nothing."
Remembering that he was bracing himself for this very moment from all the way to this morning, Sirius decided to take them on their offer. He wouldn't be able to get anything out of whoever brought him here if he acted antagonistic on the accounts of their invitation, "Alright, then."
And at that simple confirmation, Origami returned their lopsided smile. They urged Sirius to enter the elevator on their side of the wall first before following him themselves.
As the two of them now were at the mercy of the claustrophobic metallic chamber right after the closing of the elevator doors, Sirius took the time to wait. He was standing just behind the androgynous impostor, who started humming a tune Sirius wasn't all too familiar with softly. A minute passed, and then two, until Sirius decided that maybe they weren't going to try anything suspicious—well, even more suspicious than how they always seemed to be—after all.
Sirius decided it was his turn to strike a conversation, seeing that they had a promise to keep.
"How long have you people been stalking me?"
Origami only gave him a side eye, "That's rude. I already know you keep a super low profile. Maybe if you made a website or placed ads like a normal person, I wouldn't have been told to survey you personally for 3 whole weeks."
"So you stalked me, and you spied on me," Sirius grumbled to himself, "And you wonder why I don't want to join…"
He supposed hearing that the efforts he took as a private specialist paid off in keeping his anonymity got him to relax just enough for him to stop feeling irritated with the way Origami had changed their manner of speaking from four days ago. He wondered if they were still playing a character or was it something more innate to the face-shifter.
"So… how did this boss of yours know about Forge?" Sirius asked a different question this time, one that has been bugging him the most.
Sirius was convinced that what Origami said about working for the people he used to work for was a lie. It wouldn't make sense for an organization that disbanded officially 8 years ago to lie about their disbandment and keep hiding for years just to show up again in the present. The idea that someone picked up on the original's cause to finish what they started was more probable, though the reason why anyone would do that is lost on him. He asked that question hoping that Origami had caught up on his suspicions.
"I thought all my records of enrolling there were…." He stopped, realizing he would have spoken too much, "How would you know where I enrolled if you weren't part of the original Task Force?"
Origami only chuckled, "Wasn't it obvious already? Just because the school itself removed your records doesn't mean it doesn't exist. You just have to know where to find 'em."
"... Meaning?"
"I'm a former CIA head intelligence officer! That's how I got the records about you!"
Sirius felt his eyes widened into plates. Origami was just grinning at him when he did. He never thought in a million years that the person beside him was a former CIA agent, but Sirius supposed it would make sense that central government would know more than the average—
"Wait, you're lying aren't you?!" Sirius exclaimed, "There's no such thing as a CIA head intelligence officer!"
Origami stuck out their tongue, "Got you!"
Sirius balled his hand into a fist, he was back to square one without getting any meaningful info out of them.
"Well, I wasn't completely lying, anyways," The face-changing messenger said, noticing Sirius' irk, and now his confusion, "One rule of espionage kid; you just have to know people to know people."
"Please don't call me 'kid' using that face…" Sirius deadpanned, "And what do you mean by that? You think other people keep tabs on me?"
"Someone out there keeps memories, I'm sure you get it by now. You don't live in a bubble, even someone like you leaves behind traces, and yours my friend… goes back way before the Crisis," Origami said, their tone foreboding as if knowing those were the words Sirius didn't know he was afraid to hear, "And that brings me back to what I said about the part of us awaiting your return, Wilsk."
"That's impossible," Sirius' answer came a tad too quick. He realized this, of course, and held back the next set of words he almost accidentally spilled: "They're all dead."
"Heheh," Origami chuckled to themselves, "I suppose it's hard to believe at this point. I get it. But don't worry, nobody holds anything against you, about what happened."
They sighed.
"In fact, I think we owe you a debt."
The momentum of the chamber moving up suddenly stopped, and the elevator door opened with another ding, showing a rather similar layout to the floor below.
"Shall we?" Origami gestured kindly, giving way to the specialist, "Everything will be answered in time, I can promise you that."
Sirius' eyes fell upon the bright LED display just above the control panel of the elevator, and saw that they had arrived at the 25th floor. Origami was the first one to step out first, and Sirius followed closely by their tail.
"Oh, before that," Origami suddenly stopped him, "Do you have your kit on you?"
Sirius blinked at the question, "N-no, I didn't think I needed it."
"You didn't bring anything?"
"No. Should I have?" Sirius was starting to feel more and more confused.
And just when he thought Origami was about to tell him what the fuss was, the imposter simply stared at him.
"Of course not," Origami brushed him off, making a complete change in attitude, "The metal detectors here are just pretty sensitive. Whatever. Let's get going already."
Sirius let his jaw hang on its hinges, feeling utterly bewildered. Being led to the person that was responsible for reigning him here. The idea in itself was terrifying on some level. Though, he had no choice but to follow the androgynous person, seeing that was his only chance at getting more answers.
They were walking through the well-carpeted, corporate style hallways, making Sirius feel even more closed-off from the outside world with every step. The low, almost invisible humming of the air conditioner system—snaking around the architecture while being hidden from view, like artery veins on a body; drumming lively with mechanical rhythm but just a bit out of sight—was bouncing off of the pristine white painted walls and the random instances of lifeless wallpapers depicting minimalistic flowers and trees. Every now and then they'd pass a corner with fake plants in geometrical pots, open windowed meeting rooms, and closed doors leading to the offices of certain businesses. Nobody else was here, but the presence of the two of them, creating a sense of lonely liminal space that swallows the thought of security and comfort in numbers.
At one turn, Sirius found himself at what seemed to be the end of one branching hallway, covered purposely only partly with yet another unique but lifeless, flowery design of a wallpaper. At the end of it, were two double door entrances to two respective rooms, each facing each other. Origami went ahead and opened the one on the right for him, avoiding eye contact perhaps in caution of irking the already annoyed specialist further.
Sirius expected multiple eyes on him the second he entered the space, making his oxford shoes pause just a fraction of a second at the door frame, only to be met with a standard and stereotypical meeting room, complete with a large oval table surrounded by similarly designed chairs, almost as if the scene had been ripped out of a magazine advert. The lighting inside the room was acceptable, that being at almost the height of noon, the many rows of windows overlooking the New York landscape at one side of the room was enough source of sunlight to create visibility without needing the help of the indoor illumination.
It wasn't completely empty, however, as there was a figure sitting in one of the vacant chairs circling the large meeting table in the middle.
It was a little girl with shoulder length black hair, perhaps no older than 13 or 14, judging from her height and complexion. She wore a thick canvas bomber jacket zipped up all the way to the collar, covering her from the chin down. Sirius saw a half eaten bread in her hand, some of it still inside its plastic cover; the man could recall seeing that type of bread sold in his local convenience stores. Her gaze was upon him, though he didn't notice when she had turned her head, appearingly having known that he would step into the room long before he had even arrived.
"Don't worry about her, she doesn't bite," Origami whispered to Sirius when they noticed the specialist's uneasy expression when looking at the random little girl in the room. Their voice felt like winking, "I'm going to get the big lady now. Don't go anywhere."
Origami closed the door behind him, and immediately for some reason his instincts reacted to his circumstance as if he was locked in a cage with a wild animal. He looked over to the mysterious girl, who could be seen suddenly stuffing her mouth when he turned away, before looking back towards the door as if expecting it to open again as if Origami hadn't just left a few seconds before.
"You okay, Mister?"
That soft tone caught Sirius' ears. He turned his head towards the meeting table, and saw himself staring into the strange, almost cosmic depths that lay behind a pair of dark brown irises.
He wondered if this was the person who Origami had mentioned to have known him even from before his fighting years.
"What's your name, Mister?"
Or not.
Sirius felt himself jolt, he didn't realize he had his mind wander like that, "Ah, sorry. Erm, you can call me Sirius."
The girl beamed, a smile formed from ear to ear, "Like the star!"
"Haha, yeah! Like the star," Sirius laughed along. Now that he thought about it, how long has it been since someone mentioned the comparison? The last thing he could recall was Hikari making fun of his name for being similar to the word 'serious'. She wouldn't let that go for a couple of months.
Sirius was almost close to opening his mouth, before he noticed that the girl was staring at him again. The smile that formed from a few seconds ago never left her face, eternally pausing itself in that moment. It wasn't like Origami's cheshire grin that gave him the wary feeling of staring at a trickster, but the sort of smile that made the deafening silence between them enlarge the more he kept staring into the girl's bottomless gaze, engulfing him in a feeling of uncanny valley more extreme than all his years fighting Singularities. Just who is this girl?
"That… looks delicious," Sirius awkwardly pointed at the bread in her hand, before the final piece of it disappeared completely into her mouth.
"Yep! I love chocolate bread," The girl said. From underneath her seat, she lifted a small leather backpack, with a design fitting for a girl her age, that Sirius hadn't noticed before. The plastic wrapper that once held her bread was crumpled and placed deep inside the bag, only for her hand to rustle around once more, and pull out two more pieces of plastic wrapped bread, "Want one?"
Sirius couldn't even bring himself to respond to her, as she had already opened her share and started eating that one. "I-I'm good, thanks."
A small frown was etched upon her face when she heard him reject her offer, "Oh, okay then... But Origami went and bought all of this too…"
She lifted her backpack up again, this time showing its contents to Sirius. Inside was a combination of an uncountable number of plastic wrapped breads, and an even more uncountable number of empty plastic wrappings of different brands and sizes. She ate all that? Sirius thought to himself. It's almost as if she's going to hibernate for winter!
"You know Origami?" Sirius asked, trying not to get occupied with her gluttonous character. Perhaps there were details to be found from this girl.
"Yep! Origami is very nice. Origami likes giving me and Goomy all the food we want!"
"Goomy…" Sirius parroted under his breath, not exactly sure what that word meant or how he needed to react to it, "Well, who is Origami exactly? I-I mean, I just met them once and you seem to know them better than I do."
The mysterious girl thought to herself for a moment, her finger tapping at the edge of her chin. Tapping, tapping, tapping, until Sirius had found himself waiting in silence for almost half a minute. In the end, it seemed she had forgotten his question.
"Umm…" Sirius tried again to get her attention.
"O-oh, sorry! I wasn't thinking about how I should lie to you... I mean—!" The girl gasped guiltily (from accidentally confessing her thoughts or from realizing that she had left Sirius waiting for an answer, Sirius wasn't sure which), "Oh no... I forgot what Origami told me to say during this situation! Mister Sirius! Forget I said that, okay?"
"H-hey, hey, it's cool!" Sirius raised his hands to calm her down, chuckling awkwardly, "I, uhh, didn't hear anything, I swear."
The girl beamed again, "Thanks!"
Maybe he thought too much of it. The more he sought an answer, the more the questions started to pile up. The day just kept getting curiouser and curiouser, perhaps it was better to not think about it at all. He started wondering if it was all just an elaborate prank someone pulled on him, and started feeling oddly tiresome for some reason.
The door to the room opened again, breaking the awkward tension between the two occupants. Sirius was expecting Origami's last blond face to appear once more, perhaps to tease him by saying they had been listening in on Sirius and the girl's conversation, but this time the sight of an older woman took over the specialist' thought.
"Sorry for the lateness," The woman said, bowing her head a little bit, "I got caught up in a meeting."
Behind orange-tinted frameless glasses, the woman's hazel-colored eyes looked up at Sirius. She wasn't as tall as he was, probably only a few inches behind, but when she stood up straight Sirius could feel the authority figure outlining her form, making him feel subconsciously small by comparison. The fact that she was also wearing a modest office suit and skirt, with ivory skin beautified with a proper amount of makeup and auburn hair neatly combed over her shoulder, helped create the image of a high ranking business woman.
But Sirius couldn't even focus on all of those as another suspicion arose inside him, "... Origami?"
"Nope, not me!" Another voice piped in. From outside the room, Origami poked their head in, grinning as they did, "I'll be excused then, Ma'am."
"Of course," The woman said in return with a curt nod, "Enjoy your weekend, Origami."
Watching Origami nod at her in return before disappearing to the other direction of the hallway made Sirius sigh in relief. He averted his attention back to the woman before him, and found her merely smiling at him, "I'm sure you have a lot to ask, Mr. Wilsk."
She held out a hand, expecting him to shake it. But Sirius suddenly had found himself fumbling over his own words, not knowing whether he should shake her hand first or respond to her first.
He decided to do both, "A-ah, right. Umm, Sirius is fine, Miss…"
"My colleagues call me Handler, for security reasons, of course," The woman said, "But you may call me Victoria Stane."
"Victoria Stane…" Somehow the word sounded familiar when it rolled off Sirius' tongue, "Victoria Stane… Victoria Stane?"
"Yes, that is my name."
"S-sorry…" Sirius meekly responded as he let go of her hand, feeling embarrassed for getting lost in thought like that. He brushed away his suspicious feelings of familiarity with the woman in front of him, thinking it as some kind of mistake, "You… wanted to see me?"
The specialist felt a kind of odd pull within his heart, almost like a mixture of concern over the fact that the woman in front of him had stalked him without his knowledge, and bashfulness over the flattery that came afterwards. He should choose his next words carefully, something in his mind told him that Victoria was a woman who could steer the conversation to any direction she could possibly want.
"Hmm," Victoria smirked, her expression almost playful, "See you? Heh. I have had many opportunities to do that. Though meeting you is another story entirely, one of which I have had looked forward to even before my decision of recruiting you into our team."
Sirius' mind went back to Origami's words, about people who remembered him in the past. She was an older woman, Sirius guessed, but he would be able to recall those who were senior to him should he meet them as a child. She didn't seem to have met him before, and there's a possibility of her being dishonest, but neither could he recall her in his memory either.
"So, you're not Task Force," Sirius started.
Victoria nodded, "I'm not."
"But you're a Handler… for a team?"
"Very astute."
"You're a successor?"
"More or less," She didn't seem to react much when Sirius' started looking at her in irk.
"Well, I suppose I would've remembered you if you were," Sirius said, racking his brains for any semblance of clues left. Though he couldn't shake off the weird angering emotion deep within his chest; the fact that it was so easy to get an answer out of her baffled him, "But that didn't explain why I was almost killed back then."
"Ah, do let me reiterate. I might be learning from the same people you used to work for, but I am not Task Force," Victoria's amber-like, almost shining eyes climbed up to meet his crimson ones, almost hypnotizing him, "I have my own… let's say, personal goal to accomplish, unlike the quest to exterminate all Singularities the original used to uphold as a mission. I have no need for people who could only kill Living Quirks for a living, you see. There must be an effort to study them, catalog them—understand how these things come to be. Though, in that same note, it was perhaps also my reasoning for re-studying you—for lack of a better term. I assure you, there was no ill-intent to harm in my efforts to get you here…"
Both of them were quiet for a few seconds.
"Was that your way of apologizing to me?" Sirius joked dryly.
But Victoria just chuckled, "Perhaps. I considered it. Though I would know it wouldn't have worked."
She pulled a seat from a number of them that encircled the giant table inside the meeting room and sat down. The afternoon light from the window gleaming off of her round glasses, her sharp chin rested upon her hand, giving a sense that she was calm and in complete control of the situation.
Sirius was watching her quietly, internally applauding Victoria for her astute hypothesis, having not forgotten the fact that Victoria Stane herself knew that she had either coerced or been complacent to Origami's dangerous attempt to test him the other day.
"So, as an actual apology, I will give you this," Victoria said, smiling her red-lipsticky lips once more. She pulled out her red smartphone and started typing something Sirius couldn't see, "This is compensation for our fraudulent commission to your services."
Sirius lifted his eyebrow, but his confusion would soon be flushed away when he felt his phone buzz inside his pants.
"This is indemnification for almost harming your life."
He pulled out his phone, its screen was already turned on from having messages flooding in one after another, letting him see the absurd amount of money Victoria had sent to his bank account. "Wha—?!"
"This is indemnification for almost harming Hanamiya Hikari's life."
"H-hold on, hold on!"
"And this is—"
"STOP!" Sirius waved his hands across his face, "Just… stop! I get it! I-I…"
What should he say here? He forgave her? He didn't? His thoughts were swimming— drowning in money; he could believe that the average person would instantly forget the fact that they were almost killed by a Chrysalis. The numbers that appeared on his screen were still pictured in his mind, and he had no choice but to turn off his notifications and force his phone back in his pocket.
"I-I just don't understand why you needed to lie about it. To get me here, I mean. W-why's the big secret?" Sirius backtracked once more, "I mean, couldn't you have put up fliers instead of testing me on some abandoned campus? Couldn't you have just called me?"
He didn't want to guess that whatever reason she had was economically motivated; or worse, politically motivated. Perhaps her being honest about it would ease his mind a little, as he already had multiple guesses floating around in his mind. Victoria, however, didn't do that. What she did instead was to include the 3rd occupant in the room that was here from the very beginning.
"Marianne, come here please," Victoria called to the mysterious little girl from before, who Sirius almost forgot was there in the room with them.
The little girl— Marianne, stopped just as she was halfway through putting another bite into yet another piece of bread when she was called. She jumped down from her seat, not making even a single sound of compliance, and briskly walked around the large table before reaching Victoria's side. With both her hands holding Marriane's shoulder, the older woman made the little girl face Sirius completely.
"Inside this girl is a Singularity."
It took Sirius a couple seconds to process his shock, "Wha…"
"Do not be alarmed," Victoria said calmly yet reprimanded him at the same time after seeing his bewildered expression spread across his face, "It seems that the Living Quirk inside her is in a symbiotic relationship with the user, caused from an imperfect metamorphosis that happened during her Chrysalis stage. The form you see here is the result of that same symbiosis, because in order to keep the Singularity dormant, this 24-year old girl has to be kept at her lowest biological mass."
Marianne was giving him a peace sign. Sirius was at a loss for words. Besides the revelation of Marianne's true age, he was more occupied with a certain wonder that rose inside him; personally, he had never heard of a symbiotic relationship between a Living Quirk and its human host. And he was more inclined to believe that, after the creature he fought a few days ago too, such circumstances could only include antagonistic parasitism.
"Even now you're still harboring suspicion towards me, are you not? It is understandable, but I could not risk that suspicion of yours leading me to the outcome of having myself investigated, so I did not call you beforehand. You have to be kept in the dark before today. I'm sorry," Victoria continued on with her explanation, "As far as the world's concerned, I am a philanthropist and a lawyer. Everything I've done so far, I've done behind everyone's back."
Her hands were rubbing the shoulders of the little… woman (Sirius supposed she wasn't a little girl anymore) as if Victoria was petting her, and Marianne's eyes drooped like a purring cat in response.
Sirius let his attention wander. Her alibi of not being a part of Task Force were starting to seep into his nerves, and he finally found himself not being able to help to sympathize with her reasoning. A handful of questions still linger, some of which he'd rather not say to her directly ("A lawyer? You mean I could get immunity if I were to break another couple neighborhoods?), and only one of which he had found to be the most appealing: Why me, specifically?
Then, as if reading his mind, Victoria turned to him, "And that's where you come in, Mr. Wilsk."
"Huh?" Sirius perked up, "Me?"
"Yes. You see, there are unorthodox ones like Marianne here that exist out there. Which my team has recognized in the alarming growth of social patterns… where different Singularities communicate and share knowledge with each other," Victoria said, closing her eyes as if musing over the many months of research she had done on the topic, "Like Cassie Thornn's case, for example. I've read the reports made by the police, and I believe that the Singularity you fought with back then spoke of you in familiarity, which led me to a hypothesis that these Living Quirks have evolved social interactions, implying a hierarchy of some sorts. Curious… but worrying."
"That's bad~" Marianne said dramatically. Victoria was the only one to chuckle.
"Cases like that corroborate the one danger I fear the most, as I myself have found a lead on the one that stands atop the food chain. My current objective is to swiftly deal with this danger, but with the circumstances I'm handed, I cannot blindly shoot in the dark, nor can I ask publicly for help," The woman said, ending her tone softly, "You're the only option I have left."
That uneasy feeling he feared he would experience returned to him once more the moment he realized what Victoria might be implying. But it's a bad habit of his to start grasping at straws when he had no arguments left, all that was left in him to fight with was the bad taste in his mouth from his experience of joining any kind of team made to fight the threat of Singularities. As good as it was a chance to open up his worldview with Marianne's presence in the room, or with the new unknown threat of intelligent Singularity uprising, the concern of knowing Victoria had planned on pinning Living Quirks against each other outweighed his conscience.
"Miss."
Victoria swiveled her head to the smaller girl in question, cocking her head in perplexity, "Hmm?"
Marianne then leaned upwards to whisper something in Victoria's ear, all while Sirius was watching in silent bewilderment. The older woman hummed to herself and nodded, though no words could be heard to explain why.
"Ah, of course. Excuse me, it seems that it is time for Marianne's second breakfast. Heh. She eats a lot to keep the Quirk inside her at bay, you see," Victoria said, not a hint of shame or unsureness in her tone, "Please mull over it, Mr. Wilsk. There will be a briefing in two days with all the other members to discuss this matter fu—"
"I'm sorry… I don't think I can agree with that."
The older woman and her little companion both looked at him.
"I-I was kicked out of the Task Force for a reason. And I don't intend to return into who I was anymore," Sirius returned to his meek self, unsure how to form the right words to speak, "You have to ask someone else. I'm… I'm done being anyone's warhound."
Even Marianne who had been chirping in lackadaisical innocence started sharing the crestfallen look the older man gave. Inside, Sirius was ready to put everything behind him after he had managed to get one piece of information he had come all the way here for. He wasn't even thinking about reporting her to the police or the heroes, it was as if… he was so disappointed in what their conversation had led towards that he didn't want to think about anything for the remainder of the day.
"Forgive me for my insistence, Mr. Wilsk, but I cannot do that," Victoria said, standing up to face him in equal line of sight.
The man pursed his lips and let her speak. Something about the way Victoria looked at him felt extremely intense.
"You are the final piece of the puzzle. You are a man capable of speaking to a Singularity's soul directly. I need an empath to connect with our modern fears, understand why they form in the first place," Victoria said, eyes practically boring into his even through the glasses she wore, "I can hire a gun any time of the day, but that option will only risk me losing Marianne. All I ask is cooperation, not devotion."
"But how?!" Sirius found himself raising his voice, "H-how do you expect anyone to study these things without having to kill them as well?! I have spent 8 years trying to answer that question, a-and yet… I-I know that you're just desperate for another expandable Miss Stane, I-I'd rather not you lie to me about that…"
The Great Singularity Crisis ended, and the world went on with their lives after that. But Sirius instead had to spend his life after that being a disgrace to a cause he once believed in. Sure, no one was there to remind him of it, but what difference did that make? The silence was as deafening as a roar of boos and degradation. He wasn't a hero, he couldn't be celebrated, at least Origami was right about that. Will that be the fate of Marianne too after Victoria is done with her goal? Will she be thrown away at the end of it all?
Like I was?
He had tried to put it in a way that his true feelings were hidden under a small guise of self-paraphrase, though it seemed Victoria could see through that as well.
Suddenly, Marianne started tugging at Victoria's fingers, "Miss…" The tone of her voice was a perturbed one.
"It's okay, Marianne," The older woman smiled down, her eyes still hidden behind her glasses, "Just like we practiced."
Marianne blinked, before pacing back from the older woman, letting the hold her fingers had on Victoria's clothes to release without so much as a whine.
The specialist's eyes kept turning from Victoria to the girl. Unable to exactly put into words the pressure he felt. He looked down at his feet in an effort to ascertain his responding contemplation, leaving the three of them in silence once more.
"You're right. I am desperate. But not because I want to solve this danger quickly, but because I have no other options left."
Victoria's expressions were almost hidden behind the shadow that completely engulfed her face, thanks to the light of the noon's sun that outlined her figure from the rows of wide framed windows behind her. Sirius was led subconsciously to lower his gaze in caution, not being able to read what the other speaker was thinking. What he could only note of importance was the orange hued glasses that she wore, the low shine of it like the eyes of a predator in the dark.
"When I found Marianne it was only by luck that we were able to come to an understanding; that there is a technicality to her power that allows her to exist and think like a human. But what about other children? What of the other unorthodox victims that people wouldn't be able to reach?" She took a step forward, pressuring over Sirius just from her silhouette alone, "No matter how hard I try I could never be able to bypass the wall that exists between the flesh and the soul, and I hardly believe anyone could too until I've found you. You can figure out the mystery of the Living Quirks, Sirius."
The man in question didn't even realize how close she had gotten to him. He had to be careful to not trip on his own foot by accident when he had to take a few steps back due to surprise.
Not good, he was getting overwhelmed, "... But even so, this Quirk of mine hasn't been used properly for a long time, I-I might as well be—"
Victoria shook her head, exasperated, as if she had been hearing the same question—predicting it would come—rewinding within her head, "I will never put you into the same position you were during the Crisis. You are better than a warhound. The Ministry of Defense have taken you for granted, I'm sure, but I. am. not. those. men."
Once, he had thought that he was one of the worst people he knew capable of making so many excuses, but that single last line of hers just shut him up completely. If Honoka could see him now, he could just imagine the displeased look on her face. The shameless way Victoria had formed her words, the inspiring tone of voice that she used, it brought Sirius back to his youth; to the period in his life once revolving around the speeches of legendary Top 10s, colorful merchandise, and classical hero posters.
"You are the one I— no… The one humanity needs, right now!"
The words he didn't know he wanted to hear were ringing inside his brain. He had even forgotten why he had been there in the first place, but it certainly wasn't this.
Unfortunately, Marianne had managed to cut off his next thought.
"Mister Sirius, please step back."
The specialist turned to her, he didn't quite exactly catch what she had said to him from the drumming of his own flustered heart. Though he couldn't properly ask her about it when he saw how big her deep brown eyes had gotten. She was staring straight at him with an otherworldly gaze.
"You do not have your weapons on you," She continued. The soft voice she had from before was contrasting the uncanny atmosphere that her expression indicated, "And Miss does not want you to die."
For a brief second, Sirius glanced at Victoria who, despite Sirius' presupposition of her mirroring his shambling mental disposition, hadn't turned away from facing him at all.
Could she not have heard what Marianne said? Was this something that the girl regularly—
"Wait… what's that sou—"
PHWEEEEEEEEE…
CRASH!
Sirius was sent back to the wall behind him violently as a large gust of wind had come out of nowhere. The pain of slamming the wallpapered concrete wall with the same speed of falling from a 1-story house was overwhelming him enough to make him not notice the bits of glass and pebbles scratching at his face and hands. He slid down the wall as gravity took control of him once again, and, during his body's panicked response to having all his air knocked out of him, felt himself breathing a large cloud of dust.
He coughed, from the straining bones and suffocating lungs. His disordered senses slowly got back to him, and he could now feel the small cuts on his hands starting to attack his pain receptors as he tried to push himself back up from the sprawling position he had upon the carpeted floor. A low bestial hum shook the debris-filled carpeted ground beneath him. Just as distracting as the warm air that hit the temple of his head.
"ℍ𝕞? 𝕊𝕠𝕣𝕣𝕪. ℍ𝕞? 𝕊𝕠𝕣𝕣𝕪."
He looked up, wishing he hadn't opened his eyes so quickly for the dust to start blinding him, before finding himself staring at a Singularity.
Though his eyes could only make up a blurry outline, he knew that he was staring at a large bipedal winged creature. Its wings towered over him and canopied over the space that once had been the meeting room roof, its legs shook the concrete floor with every step, but… there was something wrong with them. The shape didn't remind Sirius of a bird at all, with how its limbs seemed to have oddly angled joints, and how the membrane of its wings looked strangely transparent at times; it wasn't a bird, rather, it was an almost 5 meter tall fly molded to shape like one.
It didn't take long for the instinctive human fear to start permeating throughout Sirius' body, freezing him in spot as the fly-bird's proboscis started outlining his shape, sniffing him. Uneven shaped compound eyes glistened under the afternoon winter sun, with no apparent retinas it was difficult to tell exactly where the Living Quirk was looking, but Sirius had a pretty good guess.
"ℍ𝕞. 𝕊𝕟𝕚𝕗𝕗. ℍ𝕞. 𝕋𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕠𝕟𝕖. ℍ𝕞. ℍ𝕞. ℕ𝕠𝕥. ℍ𝕞. 𝕊𝕠𝕣𝕣𝕪. ℕ𝕠𝕥. ℍ𝕞," It said, with an inhumane voice bent out of shape as it spoke out of its proboscis, like hearing someone trying to speak through a broken windpipe.
No weapons, no plans, and not a single shred of idea of how his day could even have come to this. Fortunately, the fly-bird turned away from him, unbeknownst of the reason why. He will soon learn, not in the most comfortable way, that he wasn't the only one caught in the hurricane of it all.
With his sight now completely free from the dust that surrounded his field of vision, he could see the sight of Victoria's body leaning spread-armed at the corner where the wall and the floor had met. She was motionless, surrounded by debris and broken chairs, covered in the same concrete dust Sirius was engulfed in. The Singularity approached her, winged forelimbs and hind legs working together to shake the building with its size just by walking.
Sirius watched when it got close enough to Victoria. Its misshapen proboscis lowered down alongside it's deformed head, the stout black insect-like claws on the joint of its wings tugging at the debris around her, clearing the area for it to inspect.
"ℍ𝕖𝕣. ℍ𝕖𝕣. ℍ𝕖𝕣."
The specialist forced his upper body up, heart's a-beating madly, unable to stop his body from wanting to throw itself between the monster and the woman, regardless of whatever suspicion he had of her before.
A fast moving silhouette zipped past him from the corner of his eyesight, before making contact with the fly with a loud WHAM!
The intense wind pressure and the sound of building structures getting destroyed reminded him of two things: a tropical cyclone, and a fight to the death between two super powered individuals. He could hear the cluttering of debris and office furniture flying around him from the force of the air movements, though he couldn't see it, much less his surroundings, from having to shield his eyes once more with his arms to prevent the coming of violent dust storms.
Luckily for him, his mind had been awake for a couple seconds now despite the drumming of his panicked heart, enough for him to plan an escape route while carrying both Victoria and Marriane, wherever the former was. Though even that too, he felt it got stuck in his throat the moment he opened his eyes at the slightest sign of calming, and saw the sight of another monster standing before him and Victoria.
'Monster' was Sirius' first thought as he saw the stranger's towering 3 meter form, but the obvious humanoid shape was giving him a sense of familiarity somewhat. Looking at it for longer than a certain period of time was… uncomfortable; like a patchwork of different dolls sewn together and dipped in living tar. Apparent skin and flesh mass were connected to an unknown flowing black substance that acted as its carapace, creating a ghastly form that gave the impression of God's incomplete combination of human and something else.
It turned its head towards Sirius, as if it had known the man had been there the whole time. Sirius saw the stranger's face, and felt his own stomach churn at the grotesqueness of it. The lack of a lower jaw, the exposed muscle fibers on its neck connecting each obtruding carapace, the unnaturally long black hair moving individually as if submerged in water; all seemed to compliment the eldritch gaze behind its jet black eye sockets.
Sirius felt his body creaked, something must have bruised when he was pushed back from the wind pressure. Not to mention the flow of adrenaline in his body steadying made his pain absorption stronger, "O-ouch!"
He slapped a hand over his mouth, feeling that that one word would throw the new strange creature into a berserking state.
But it didn't, it merely… stared at him; he couldn't tell from the lack of eyes in its sockets.
"ℍ𝕞! ℍ𝕞! ℍ𝕞𝕙𝕞𝕙𝕞𝕙𝕞𝕙𝕞—"
Both the specialist and the black-clad monster turned their attention towards the space across from them. The hallway on the other side of the wall was completely destroyed, canopied only by a remainder of what used to be the floor above, and within it was the fly-bird thing; standing up on its hind legs and extending its crooked, transparent wings like an intimidation technique.
The building floor seemed to vibrate suddenly, even when covered with a thick layer of carpet over it Sirius could feel a kinetic hum in his bones and ears. It was only when he looked back at the first Singularity did he realize what was happening; instead of feathers, the Singularity had transparent dragonfly-like wings jutting out of its forelimbs that vibrated individually, and with the way they spread eagled, Sirius could see afterimages from how fast it was violently juddering.
It wasn't an intimidation technique, it was readying to fly.
Sirius threw himself forward. One step, two steps, quickly, until he reached Victoria in just under 2 seconds before… FWOOOM!
Another gust of wind exploded behind him as he shielded what he hoped was Victoria under him (he didn't dare to open his eyes as he felt another sea of dust and debris blanketing him). There were distant screams, the sound of another part of the building breaking, and faraway noises of something large exchanging blows with something fast.
A coughing sound brought Sirius back into reality. He opened his eyes and looked down, and saw the sight of Victoria half buried in gray dust and blood. It wasn't his.
"A-ah!" Sirius' first instinct was always to panic, but his second was to swallow that panic whole; to hell with gathering information! "Miss Stane! I'm going to lift you up now, can you move?!"
"S-Sirius," Victoria coughed his name. The right side of her glasses was completely destroyed, and Sirius could see small pieces of the shrapnel jutting out of the blood-painted right side of her face, "Y-you… You…"
Sirius bit his lip, "It's alright! I'll get you out of here, okay?" He bent down to make sure she could hear him, "I'm going to pull your right hand in 3 and put it around my shou—"
"Y-you have to help her…"
The specialist felt his brain stop for a moment, unsure if he had just heard her right, until Victoria's left hand shot up to his collar and pulled his head down further.
"M-Marianne won't be able to hold that thing off forever. There are other people in this building, Sirius…" Victoria breathed out weekly between coughs, "Save them…"
Marianne? Did she say Marianne? But Sirius hadn't seen her since the initial—
"Inside this girl is a Singularity."
… It's not the right time to start thoroughly questioning how such a thing could exist, Sirius decided to himself. There are other people in the building, that meant he needed to find them and escort them to safety as well. He had to start with Victoria now that he was the nearest to her, and he had to do it quickly.
"I-I have to get you out of here first, Miss Stane!" Sirius said firmly, gently pulling off the hand that was on his collar.
Victoria didn't protest, she merely scanned him up and down with the only functioning eye she had left. She watched as Sirius first worked with the debris of the ceiling wall that surrounded her, burying small parts of her body. Slowly, he got her free, and suddenly another stroke of luck befall upon the two.
"—Waverider's arrived at the location, sir! Please advi—" A new voice entered the building. Even with the faraway noises of inhuman conflict, that boisterous tone had set its foot inside the space, "Sir! There are survivors!"
The specialist looked past his shoulder, and was met with the sight of blue spandex, facemask,w and an unnaturally large cylinder that the new person wore on their back. His mind clicked, that sort of attire was nothing short of familiar and—he would even think in the back of his mind—intimate. "A hero!"
"Sir! Can you hear me?!" The hero was in fact a heroine, navy blue hair flowing down into a long braid down her back. She had a young-looking face, contorted into a look of determination and worry, fitting for a hero her age, "Do you need medical assistance?"
Oh no, with the way she's shouting—
"ℍ𝕞! 𝕃𝕠𝕦𝕕! ℍ𝕞! ℍ𝕞𝕙𝕞𝕙𝕞𝕙𝕞—"
A black shadow flew over Sirius, the air seemed to vibrate as it did, before it landed between him and the heroine; Waverider if he could remember correctly. It was the fly-bird Singularity, but different—wounded, full of punctures, scars, and odd burn marks that oozed both bile-like substance and an unknown steaming black liquid.
"A-a Singularity?!" Sirius heard Waverider shriek.
The creature lowered its head and proboscis, looming over the figure of Waverider in her battle stance, but neither of them had made the first move, "ℍ𝕞𝕙𝕞𝕙𝕞𝕙𝕞… ℍ𝕞? ℍ𝕞? ℕ𝕠𝕥 𝕙𝕖𝕣? ℕ𝕠𝕥 𝕙𝕖𝕣?"
Another scream.
Sirius glanced to his side and saw, with the walls between the rooms on the floor mostly destroyed, a group of well-suited businessmen on the room across from them. He didn't notice them before, but now that he did he realized that they too were in the same situation Victoria was.
"ℍ𝕞…"
The fly-bird reverberated its transparent wings and leapt, approaching the group of businessmen.
"H-hey! Oh no!" Waverider realized the danger and, being the hero that she was, immediately jumped into action.
Her hand moved in circles, like creating symbols within the air. Then, as if commanded, the cylinder on her back spat out a waterspout, gathering itself within empty space before moving as one like a giant snake. This was perhaps only a preview of Waverider's abilities, but she seemed confident enough to wield it without hesitation. She flowed effortlessly, and the water too followed her dance. With one fast motion with her hand, the floating stream of water shot forward, lassoing around the Singularity's hind legs while midair. Another motion was made, and the creature was suddenly pulled back.
The fly-bird let out an ear-shrieking cry as it was forced down to the floor with a painful thud. It didn't seem very pleased with what had happened to it, and immediately whirled back to face Waverider in response. Its wings spread open and started vibrating, with one fell swoop the creature brought both wings down, creating an explosion of wind that the heroine just wouldn't be able to block or dodge against.
Waverider screamed as she found herself flying through the air and against a wall, cracking it behind her before falling onto the floor and into a cloud of dust.
The Singularity didn't plan on giving her the opportunity of fighting back, so it prepared to leap forward again and pounce her dead onto the concrete floor.
Sirius' decision was split second, and he was already running towards Waverider's motionless figure. With a quick slide, he took her into his hands, and the Singularity missed them just a hair's length before diving onto the concrete floor with a loud BANG!
The specialist and the heroine in his arms were somehow in flight. The force of the fly Singularity's acceleration must have been strong enough to kick them into the air and out of the building. It seemed like time had slowed down in Sirius' mind. He could see Victoria's body getting further… further… further… and further away, and gravity had taken over his weight and pulled him to a freefall.
He was going to die. At that moment, his body was sure of it. Every quarter of a second that passed while he felt the wind on his back brought him dread and relief. The drumming of his heart was slow, slower than ever, like he was in a passage of time slowed to one of a thousandth of itself, and all he could hear was one eternal beat. The image of dirty blonde hair and glasses too big for the wearer was filling his eyes.
That was until a sudden force pulled him and the heroine he was holding onto, strong enough to fly him upwards into the sky before crashing back onto the building's exterior. His senses were returned to him like a shotgun shell to the head, and he suddenly noticed the thin obsidian tail that wrapped around Waverider's cylinder, and the owner of the tail swinging from window to window.
"M-Marianne…" Sirius gasped out, unsure if he was calling for her in joy or in shock to see her in this state.
The humanoid paid him no mind, or it didn't even hear him at all. It kept climbing up the skyscraper, presumably to the floor they had once been.
Sirius took this time to take a glance at the heroine and the equipment he had been holding on to in order not to fall. Waverider was very much awake, and she was as shocked and confused about the situation as he was judging from her bewildered expression.
The Marianne-thing finally reached the floor of their destination, its tail letting go of the cylinder that carried both Sirius and Waverider onto the debris-filled carpeted ground, and now the three of them were face-to-face with the fly-bird once again.
Marianne's Singularity seemed to have placed them right in the destroyed room where the businessmen were. Sirius could now see the ghastly scene before him clearly; men in suits scattered around the room in panic, some injured, and one was held within the fly-bird's three-fingered hands, thrashing and screaming helplessly.
The specialist took one worried look towards Marianne or whatever the creature was, not realizing the creature had been looking at him with sunken eye sockets as well, almost making him jump upon the realization.
"𝕎𝕚𝕝𝕤𝕜."
It talked!
"O-oh my god, it talks…" Waverider squeaked beside him.
Sirius stared at the large Marianne-thing in a mixture of wonder and fear, unsure if the girl was still inside the giant humanoid or did something else replace her instead.
"𝕋𝕙𝕖 𝕔𝕦𝕣 𝕡𝕣𝕠𝕧𝕖𝕤 𝕥𝕠 𝕓𝕖 𝕒 𝕞𝕦𝕔𝕙 𝕠𝕟𝕖𝕣𝕠𝕦𝕤 𝕗𝕠𝕖. 𝔸𝕥 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕣𝕒𝕥𝕖, 𝕚𝕥 𝕨𝕚𝕝𝕝 𝕓𝕖 𝕕𝕚𝕗𝕗𝕚𝕔𝕦𝕝𝕥 𝕥𝕠 𝕞𝕒𝕚𝕟𝕥𝕒𝕚𝕟 𝕞𝕪 𝕞𝕒𝕤𝕤 𝕨𝕙𝕚𝕝𝕖 𝕡𝕣𝕠𝕥𝕖𝕔𝕥𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕤𝕖 𝕙𝕦𝕞𝕒𝕟𝕤," The Marianne-thing told him. The eloquent way it spoke had caught Sirius in a whiplash, "𝕀 𝕨𝕚𝕝𝕝 𝕥𝕒𝕜𝕖 𝕔𝕒𝕣𝕖 𝕠𝕗 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕓𝕝𝕒𝕤𝕥𝕖𝕕 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕟𝕘, 𝕚𝕟 𝕥𝕦𝕣𝕟 𝕀 𝕖𝕩𝕡𝕖𝕔𝕥 𝕪𝕠𝕦 𝕥𝕠 𝕤𝕥𝕒𝕪 𝕙𝕖𝕣𝕖 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕟𝕠𝕥 𝕕𝕚𝕖."
The Marianne Singularity decided not to elaborate further. It stepped forward and stood up, letting its size call the attention of the fly-bird Singularity. It was here did Sirius notice the different shape that the humanoid Singularity had from before; it was a bit leaner, shorter, as if compensating for healing the black carapace it had lost during the initial fight.
"ℍ𝕞?! 𝕂ℍ𝕂ℍ𝕂ℍ𝕂ℍ𝕂ℍℍ𝕂!" The sound of the fly's violent chattering proboscis filled the air the second it noticed Marianne-thing. The humanoid Singularity didn't waste time to land the first move.
The fly-bird was headbutted from below as Marianne-thing went and judo-hold its opponent on its lower torso. The surprise attack was enough for the fly Singularity to release the man it had in its hands, dropping him to the floor as the two monsters took their battles elsewhere.
Sirius too, after watching the scene unfold, decided that it wasn't time to stay idle.
"PICK HIM UP!" He commanded the businessmen with every boiling blood in his adrenaline-addled body, "COME ON! LET'S GO!"
He himself started helping other injured well-suited men to stand up, while screaming on top of his lungs to the other occupants in the room.
"Pick up the wounded! We gotta go before they come back!"
Little by little the shaken businessmen were starting to follow his lead as he guided them into each of their injured colleagues. Those that could stand up were tasked to support those that can't, and Sirius wasn't in the mood to argue with those that complained.
The specialist glanced around in a haste, taking note of every civilian that needed assistance, until he noticed the sight of Waverider once more, sitting still and looking all shaken up on the spot where Marianne-thing had last dropped her off.
"Hey, are you okay?" Sirius ran over towards her without skipping a beat, "Can you stand up?"
"I-I…" The heroine's mouth was opening and closing like a goldfish.
Sirius had seen many times before, when someone thoroughly unprepared is thrown into a situation that they couldn't have possibly predicted to happen. It wasn't easy the first time it happened to him, and it wasn't easy now.
"Hey, look, we gotta get out of here," Sirius said in trepidation, the sound of fighting on the other side of the floor was ringing his ears, "If you stay here you're dead. I'm gonna need you to be strong for a sec, is that alright?"
Waverider's eyes seemed to gleam under her facemask, but Sirius could still see the trembling on her lips. He wasn't sure what she was thinking, but it seemed like he didn't need long to find out.
"I-I can stand. Thank you," Waverider slowly pulled herself up. Sirius couldn't help but to smile softly and hope she didn't notice.
"Ah, what company are you from?"
"S-sorry?"
"I mean… Do you know if there's going to be a backup coming?" Sirius asked her again after seeing the confused look on her face.
The heroine furrowed her eyebrows. "I-I don't know, I work under Pro Hero Blue Blood's company, b-but I'm just an intern and… H-hold on, let me just—" Then, she brought a hand towards her earpiece and started to speak, "S-sir! It's me! We have a Singularity alert! Danger type: Imago! … That's right, sir! Near Whitehall Street, sir! Y-yes, thank you! I'll do my best!"
Sirius waited until it seemed like the heroine had finished contacting her supervisor (though he wasn't sure if these days intern superheroes still had personal supervisors like he did during his time). She gazed back at him with a more optimistic look.
"I-I'm the only one patrolling in this area so it's gonna take the others some time, b-but they're coming!" Waverider said enthusiastically.
Sirius nodded along, "Good, goo—"
WHAM! WHAM!
POW!
"𝕊𝕆ℝℝℝ𝔼𝔼𝔼𝕂ℍ! 𝕂ℍ! 𝕂ℍ 𝕂ℍ!"
"ℝ𝔸𝔸𝔸𝔸𝔸ℍℝ𝔾𝔾!"
The specialist whirled back in alert, fearing that the two beasts would crash into them any second from how close the sound of their fighting was. He thought back to what Victoria said about Marianne, about how she wouldn't be able to keep fighting forever, and so far what that woman had said had been true. He had no kit, nor any weapons he could use, and if Marianne lost…
"L-listen, Waverider, right?" Sirius turned to the heroine next to him, earning a nod from her, "I'm sorry, but I'm going to need your help defeating that Singularity."
"E-eh? B-but, the backup—"
"There's no time, it's too dangerous to let them fight it out up here," Sirius pressed on, "We have to keep that fly-looking thing grounded on the parking lot below. I have a plan."
"B-but! What about the black goo one?"
Sirius gulped, "T-that one will go away on its own once the fly-thing is dead, I-I think…"
"H-huh?!"
"Look, you just need to trust me, okay?" Sirius pleaded, knowing it was his last resort, "If you can get up here with your Quirk, that means you can get us down safely too. If we let them fight here, we're just risking more people being hurt!"
Waverider seemed hesitant. Well, who wouldn't be? Nothing Sirius told her made sense, not even he knew particularly why he wanted to do this, just he just knew he had to.
"A-alright…" The heroine took in a couple of deep breaths, steeling her nerves, "Alright! What should we do?"
Sirius felt his heart explode in a sudden rush of determination, "Follow me!"
It was a life and death situation, people's lives were at risk, his life was at risk, but for some reason there was a thrill to it—the certain rush of eureka in the middle of a crucial time. During one span of his life—perhaps just certain moments in time, ones that he didn't realize he had forgotten—he knew he had been addicted to it. Perhaps now was the right time to let himself get carried by that high again.
Waverider and him were out of the destroyed meeting room, then entered the destroyed hallway, before finally finding themselves in another room where Marianne-thing and the fly-bird was still fighting. The way they clashed was like a blur, from time to time only either of them would be faster than the other. Punches, kicks, pounces, and bites, it seemed like every killing blow they made to the other could all be found in just a split second period. Sirius didn't have time to be awestruck at the display.
"MARIANNE!" He shouted at the top of his lungs, "BRING IT DOWN TO THE PARKING LOT!"
The humanoid Singularity didn't have eyes, so Sirius could never truly tell if it had seen him. But when it started grappling the fly-bird again, it seemed clear to Sirius that it had at least heard him. For a few seconds, the beasts struggled against each other, one trying to escape the other's grasp, but Marianne was the one to prevail the contest of strength as it pushed the fly-bird as well as itself over the edge of the building's floor, and let the both of them freefall towards the ground.
"Alright, let's go down!" Sirius turned to the newbie heroine behind him.
"Y-yes!" Waverider responded, face sweating in anticipation.
The blue-clad heroine moved her hands, summoning water again from the giant cylinder on her back. As the two of them were nearing the edge of the building, ready to jump, Waverider gestured towards the floor where the water took the weight of their feet just as they leapt over the edge.
It was like surfing; wave-riding, to be exact, as the water seemed to be carrying their weight down anomalously from the skyscraper's height. Sirius found difficulty in maintaining balance even when they were still only a quarter way down, and had to resort to holding Waverider's hand for support. When Sirius glanced down to the bottom of their height, he saw that both Singularities had arrived there first, leaving a large pothole on the asphalt where they landed, and started exchanging blows once more. There were people running from the scene in the distance, the panic alarm must've already been rung by now. But he couldn't quite focus on that when he realized something was wrong in the fight unfolding below; Marianne's Singularity seemed struggling unlike before, where she seemed to resort less on fast-paced movements and more on grappling and ripping at whatever it can reach on it's opponent.
Once Waverider's water had transported them all the way down towards the lot, the Marianne-thing was already keeping distance from its opponent. It didn't seem in the best of state; some of its carapace seemed to have been scraped off, and it had lost a significant amount of its mass. The fly Singularity on the other hand didn't seem to fare better either, as it was struggling to even stand up.
Sirius immediately jumped down from the floating body of water once he found a safe height, before approaching Marianne-thing.
"Marianne!"
The monster passed a glance at Sirius, "𝕀 𝕡𝕣𝕒𝕪 𝕪𝕠𝕦 𝕡𝕣𝕠𝕧𝕚𝕕𝕖 𝕒𝕟 𝕒𝕕𝕖𝕢𝕦𝕒𝕥𝕖 𝕞𝕖𝕒𝕟𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕥𝕠 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕚𝕟𝕥𝕖𝕣𝕣𝕦𝕡𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕟."
"That thing's just gonna keep going up there! You need to hold it here!" Sirius shouted as loud as he could, "So I can kill it!"
"... 𝕊𝕡𝕖𝕒𝕜."
"I can't explain right now!" Sirius put his hand above his chest, marking his resolution, "Just give me an opening to touch it!"
If the humanoid creature had a (not horrifying and naturally monstrous) face, it would've made something akin to confusion at the idea of the little human believing that it could achieve something that the creature itself had difficulty doing, with a method as simple as making skin contact with an enemy who could move in near-sonic boom.
But for some reason, the Marianne-thing decided to not question it further. It glanced away from Sirius and now eyeing the nearly recovering fly-thing, "𝔸 𝕞𝕚𝕟𝕦𝕥𝕖 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕟𝕠𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕞𝕠𝕣𝕖."
Sirius gulped, and looked forward towards the opponent as well, "Good enough for me." At least he hoped it was.
The businessmen were exchanging glances, wondering what to do now that they knew that the two beasts had jumped over the building's edge and were now fighting at the parking lot. Some of them were curious enough to want to go back to see the fight ensue, but the majority opted to just start heading towards the emergency exit, like the man from before had ordered them.
That was until someone stopped in their way the moment they tried to leave the destroyed meeting room.
"I find it quite funny, don't you?"
It was Victoria Stane. Her once well tailored suit was covered in dust and scratches, there were large trails of blood trickling down her leg, arm, and even face. Her glasses were partly destroyed, along with her right eye which was buried in blood, and her hair was disheveled as if she had just been hit by a bus.
But she was standing. And she was standing firmly and calmly, as if none of the things that happened to her were there in the first place.
"Isn't this what you wanted? Isn't this what you are all here for?"
The tone of her voice was weak, raspy, fitting for someone who seemed to have just gotten the wind knocked out of them. Although her attention was focused somewhere else, specifically to one of the businessmen in front of her.
Chairman Diaz was one of the injured businessmen that didn't help himself to the burden of helping his fellow injured colleagues, everyone could see how much he wanted to leave the floor immediately in the disheveled state of his clothes, in the cuts and bruises on his face, and the panicked way of breathing he had after being picked up and almost killed by a Singularity. But the woman in front of him was gazing intensely instead of helping him and the others, as if saying a wordless 'I told you' was a more important act to her.
"You… You!" Chairman Diaz pointed angrily, dazed and confused, "You planned this!"
"I planned for this," Victoria's response was quick, as if already expecting it, "I plan for everything. Even in an unforeseen attack like this I am well prepared. Just like I had said… didn't I?"
Diaz and the others exchanged glances, but Victoria paid for their speechlessness no mind. She began walking past the chairmen, who did nothing to stop her. Not once did she stumble on the debris, not one limp within her legs, she marched towards the edge of the floor where the windows had once been, stopping just at the brink of the fall. Then, she opened her arms wide, as if she was a ruler addressing its people.
"Anyone could become a pillar of heroism and promise a greater future, anyone could wield a legion of armed men and lead them to the frontlines, but only those who already took the first step have the ability to survive and fight!" Victoria shouted, conviction lacing her every word, "There is a great need for us to see and realize that we must plan for absolute security!"
But there was a certain feeling of ominousness, especially in the man that was chairman Diaz, whose entire being was locked still in place amongst the debris and dust trying as hard as he could to swallow the schadenfreude that was stuck in his throat.
"Think of all the days you went home in fear. Think of the doubts you had about tomorrow. Think… of all of that… and lay your eyes upon complete control. Humanity and Singularity, under my control," The pressure of her voice was fortified with the sound of the inhuman conflict from below, "This is what it means to be prepared… and that is just the tip of the iceberg, gentlemen."
The group of chairmen were struck in awe. The sight of the woman was nothing short of powerful; she towered over them at the top of debris, the way she spread her arms made her look even bigger than she was, and the light of the afternoon sun shone down on her like a spotlight. There was no pause nor beat, not a single hiccup nor whimper, everything she said, she had said without imperfections; a flawless speech.
"With your support, I will bring about a new age in America."
Even she seemed to think so, as she smiled a bloody smile, seeing how all the chairmen had their eyes on her and not a single word was uttered.
"An age of security."
This was a victory.
"Where we no longer fear the monsters…"
One of many more to come.
"...as the monsters fear us."
"ℍ𝕞?!"
The fly-thing screeched in surprise when one of its hind legs was trapped once more within Marianne's grasp, just as it was starting to take off and fly. Marianne's Singularity, with all its inhuman otherworldly might, swung its giant arms down and brought the fly back to the ground with a loud WHAM, destroying the asphalt under it.
Quickly, the Marianne-thing sprung forward to overpower the other monster by pinning it down, only to find itself subjected to a kick to the face strong enough to send it back.
The fly leapt into an upright position, clearly agitated beyond recognition.
"𝕊𝕆ℝℝ𝕐! 𝕎ℍ𝔼ℝ𝔼! 𝕆𝕌𝕋! ℍ𝕀𝕄! 𝕎ℍ𝔼ℝ𝔼! 𝕃𝕆𝕌𝔻! 𝔾𝕌ℕ𝕎ℍ𝔼ℝ𝔼𝕊𝕆ℝℝ𝕐ℍ𝕀𝕄ℍ𝔼ℝℍ𝕀𝕄𝕎ℍ𝔼ℝ𝔼𝕊𝕆ℝℝ𝕐—"
"𝔹𝕖 𝕢𝕦𝕚𝕖𝕥!"
Marianne was quick to reply, and even quicker to attack. The thing's monstrous hands shot up just as the fly-bird opened its wings, preparing itself for another flight, before grabbing a handful of the membranous "feathers" on each forelimbs. Perhaps it was because the insect was already weak that Marianne's Singularity was able to rip a significant amount off of the forelimbs with one quick pull.
The fly-bird wasn't the type to stay idle and shriek whatever it had for lungs out from the pain, so it ran its tri-clawed wings across Marianne's monstrous face in order to return the favor. The Marianne-thing jolted back, as several chunks of it's gooey carapace were now on the asphalt, steaming hotly. Seeing this as an opportunity, now that it couldn't take flight anymore, the fly-bird went to manhandle it's opponent with every weight it's got, clawing and kicking and even grabbing at Marianne's black-clad body, taking out large chunks wherever the fly can reach.
Marianne's Singularity was hissing, like a large snake that was wrestling an even angrier prey, earning more damage to themselves than they would like. But it was far from defeated, knowing that the stupid insect was successfully baited to focus all of its attention on the humanoid, immediately responding back to the fly's murderous tantrum by holding it in place in a lock.
"𝕎𝕀𝕃𝕊𝕂!"
"Waverider!"
"Ready!"
The heroine's hands swayed madly in the winter breeze, moving against the wind to summon her powers once more. The cylinder which holds spouts of water was thankfully still intact; as expected of a standard grade hero equipment, and the contents within was enough for her to create constructs once more.
Her hand then shot forward, snake-like bodies of water started flying in midair from inside the cylinder. And then, carefully aiming near the wrestling giants where Sirius was running towards, the water bodies formed disc like platforms, each within differing levels, creating a makeshift stair that the specialist used immediately and without delay.
Sirius was now above level ground, above the fly-thing struggling within Marianne's lock. With a final leap off of the last water-platform, he let himself fall onto the head of the giant insect.
Holding onto a giant fly was harder than it looked, even when the creature in question was being deadlocked by another of its kind. If not for the fact that he was holding on as tight as he could to the many uncannily human-like hairs on the fly's body, he would've already been thrown into the air like a ragdoll.
"ℂ𝕒𝕣𝕖𝕗𝕦𝕝 𝕟𝕠𝕥 𝕥𝕠 𝕗𝕒𝕝𝕝 𝕠𝕟𝕥𝕠 𝕞𝕖, 𝕎𝕚𝕝𝕤𝕜!" The Marianne-thing warned as it gritted its teeth trying to hold its opponent in place, "𝔻𝕚𝕤𝕤𝕠𝕝𝕧𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕪𝕠𝕦 𝕨𝕠𝕦𝕝𝕕 𝕓𝕖 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕝𝕖𝕒𝕤𝕥 𝕠𝕗 𝕞𝕪 𝕨𝕠𝕣𝕣𝕚𝕖𝕤!"
No time to waste, then. Sirius grabbed onto locks upon locks of the fly's pelt, even digging into its blistering and bile-like skin, and began to chant.
"Feel the heat,
the flesh,
the mind, and the soul.
I am the one who answers,
the void's call."
It didn't take long for his power to take effect, it was like waiting for the breaker to gain enough voltage to fully power the lights to a room. Many things would occur first; his skin would feel numb, his hearing deafened, and even the sensation of his heartbeat would be quieted. Where he was going, the flesh was left behind. He didn't need to open nor close his eyes, the environment would change inevitably; that was one part of his power.
Host: a fitting name for a power that was able to put guests to a space beyond reality. One touch was all it took for Sirius to create a link with anyone he wished, but without practice it may as well be suicide.
He looked down, he was standing on an invisible solid surface. He looked at his hands, and they weren't covered in dust anymore. It took him a few seconds to confirm to himself that everything was going smoothly, treading the space made when two souls collide was a dangerous affair.
Anyone whose soul was strong enough to resist him would kill him where his body won't heal.
"But for some reason… a Singularity's soul is always peaceful…" Sirius thought to himself, taking notes of the space he occupied, "Alright, better finish this quickly before it realizes what's happening."
He didn't feel the violent shaking of the fly's body anymore, nor did he feel the tightening pain of grabbing onto thin hairs for dear life. Here, in this white space with nothing but the abstract, sensation was cut off. But it was too calm, as if the fly's soul had been sheltered for a very long time, unable to grow itself to understand it's own existence. He didn't have time to mull on it, this calmness was an opportunity; something that most other souls do not have the luxury of giving him.
Just as he was starting to walk, feeling himself starting to get comfortable in the numbing space, he noticed another existence in the distance. Round and pristine, bouncing off sparkles from a nonexistent light, like a pearl but floating in infinite whiteness. With nothing else around him that was seemingly as concrete as the pearl was, Sirius was confident that this has to be the core of the soul.
Time moves differently in the bridge between souls, walking over to the pearl felt like a minute and five seconds all on its own. The moment he was confident of the distance between himself and the pearl, he started his next move; he made a thought.
A perfect shape of a katana sword formed within his right hand grip a second later. This would represent himself, and an extension of his soul's core. Two cores cannot exist within the same space, and the one that yields, dies.
He raised his sword, and swung down.
"𝕎𝕙𝕒𝕥 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕗𝕦𝕔𝕜 𝕚𝕤 𝕨𝕣𝕠𝕟𝕘 𝕨𝕚𝕥𝕙 𝕪𝕠𝕦?!"
Sirius stopped just as the sharpness of his blade was an inch above the pearl. The scenery had changed, and he didn't even blink. It took him a moment to recognize where he was, but it seemed to be a crude replica of an unfamiliar office. Before him was the floating pearl, it was hovering on top of a bigger pearl-like material carved into the shape of a couch. The walls, the furniture, the books and documents inside the shelves, were all pearls. But one thing wasn't; the source of the voice from before, coming from behind Sirius. He looked past his shoulder and saw a giant fly situated in the middle of the room
It wasn't mutated nor shaped into a crude humanoid, but an enlarged version of a green house fly. It was buzzing, but softly. Its wings were vibrating every few seconds. Its eyes move along with the turning of its head. During the moment Sirius first laid eyes on it he felt his heart jump out of his chest, until it suddenly spoke, with a voice that was recognizably human
"𝕀 𝕛𝕦𝕤𝕥 𝕗𝕦𝕔𝕜𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕤𝕖𝕟𝕥 𝕪𝕠𝕦 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕖𝕞𝕒𝕚𝕝, 𝕙𝕠𝕨 𝕔𝕒𝕟 𝕪𝕠𝕦 𝕝𝕠𝕤𝕖 𝕚𝕥! 𝕐𝕠𝕦 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕟𝕜 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕗𝕦𝕔𝕜𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕔𝕝𝕚𝕖𝕟𝕥𝕤 𝕒𝕣𝕖 𝕘𝕠𝕟𝕟𝕒 𝕨𝕒𝕚𝕥 𝕗𝕠𝕣 𝕪𝕠𝕦 𝕥𝕠 𝕕𝕚𝕘 𝕥𝕙𝕣𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙 𝕪𝕠𝕦𝕣 𝕘𝕠𝕕𝕕𝕒𝕞𝕟 𝕚𝕟𝕓𝕠𝕩?!"
The fly was speaking, or it wasn't. Sirius couldn't tell, it's proboscis wasn't moving with the noises of the words.
"𝔾𝕠 𝕘𝕖𝕥 𝕁𝕠𝕙𝕟𝕤𝕠𝕟! 𝕀 𝕤𝕒𝕚𝕕 𝕘𝕠 𝕘𝕖𝕥 𝕙𝕚𝕞, 𝕘𝕠𝕕𝕕𝕒𝕞𝕞𝕚𝕥! 𝔻𝕠 𝕀 𝕙𝕒𝕧𝕖 𝕥𝕠 𝕕𝕠 𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕣𝕪𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕒𝕣𝕠𝕦𝕟𝕕 𝕙𝕖𝕣𝕖?!"
The giant fly scuttled back and forth on top of a pearl office desk, sometimes kicking over the pearl documents and the pearl stationery. Still trying to process what he was seeing, Sirius was frozen in place. But when the fly's body started to bloat, he immediately shielded himself the moment it exploded for no reason.
Thousands, perhaps millions of smaller flies had filled the space between his ears. The office space was long gone, hidden behind the green clouds that surrounded him, only the deafening sounds of wings buzzing, and the horrendous feeling of a million insects running and hitting his skin was all he could think about.
"Get off me!" Sirius wailed in panic. There were too many flies! The flailing of his sword-construct was useless against a storm of extremely small and fast insects.
Was this a form of astral-attack? Sirius thought to himself in fear. If that was the case then he needed to change strategy or else he'd be consumed like meat in a piranha pond.
But then, he felt—heard something odd within the swarm. It was something barely noticeable at first, but then he started listening closely, and he realized the flies' buzzing sounds weren't buzzing sounds at all. They were voices. Small voices, almost incomprehensible, but the second Sirius started to focus, he could make out things he started hoping he didn't hear.
"—𝕥𝕙𝕒𝕟𝕜𝕤 𝕗𝕠𝕣 𝕞𝕒𝕜𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕞𝕪 𝕡𝕣𝕖𝕤𝕖𝕟𝕥𝕒𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕟, 𝕞𝕒𝕟! 𝕀'𝕝𝕝 𝕓𝕖 𝕤𝕦𝕣𝕖 𝕥𝕠—"
"ℂ𝕠𝕞𝕖 𝕠𝕟, 𝕞𝕒𝕟. 𝕁𝕦𝕤𝕥 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕠𝕟𝕖 𝕥𝕚𝕞𝕖 𝕨𝕚𝕥𝕙 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕡𝕒𝕡𝕖𝕣𝕤 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕀'𝕝𝕝—"
"—𝔸𝕙! 𝕊𝕠𝕣𝕣𝕪, 𝕀 𝕔𝕠𝕞𝕡𝕝𝕖𝕥𝕖𝕝𝕪 𝕗𝕠𝕣𝕘𝕠𝕥 𝕒𝕓𝕠𝕦𝕥—"
"—𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕚𝕗 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕜𝕖𝕖𝕡𝕤 𝕦𝕡, 𝕀'𝕞 𝕒𝕗𝕣𝕒𝕚𝕕 𝕀 𝕙𝕒𝕧𝕖 𝕥𝕠 𝕝𝕖𝕥 𝕪𝕠𝕦 𝕘𝕠."
"—𝕗𝕒𝕧𝕠𝕣, 𝕡𝕝𝕖𝕒𝕤𝕖? 𝕁𝕦𝕤𝕥 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕠𝕟𝕖!"
"—𝕐𝕠𝕦 𝕣𝕖𝕒𝕝𝕚𝕫𝕖 𝕀'𝕞 𝕕𝕠𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕗𝕠𝕣 𝕪𝕠𝕦𝕣 𝕠𝕨𝕟 𝕘𝕠𝕠𝕕, 𝕣𝕚𝕘𝕙𝕥?"
"𝕎𝕖 𝕔𝕒𝕟'𝕥 𝕙𝕒𝕧𝕖 𝕣𝕦𝕞𝕠𝕣𝕤 𝕒𝕓𝕠𝕦𝕥 𝕒 𝕊𝕚𝕟𝕘𝕦𝕝𝕒𝕣𝕚𝕥𝕪 𝕣𝕦𝕟𝕟𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕒𝕣𝕠𝕦𝕟𝕕 𝕚𝕟 𝕠𝕦𝕣 𝕔𝕠𝕞𝕡𝕒𝕟𝕪—"
"𝕐𝕠𝕦 𝕨𝕠𝕦𝕝𝕕𝕟'𝕥 𝕓𝕖 𝕙𝕖𝕣𝕖 𝕚𝕗 𝕚𝕥 𝕨𝕒𝕤𝕟'𝕥 𝕗𝕠𝕣 𝕞𝕖."
The buzzing of the flies was starting to die down, and Sirius started to feel less and less of the crawling critters on his skin and clothes. When he opened his eyes, still a bit wary of any leftover insects flying around, he found himself standing in the same white space as before.
It seemed like he was allowed to breathe now. He took this time to think.
"The host's memories. Did the building remind it of the human it used to be?" He wondered how long a Singularity would start to forget about who they used to be, until they'd become 'too far gone'.
He thought about Marianne. He thought about whether she'd keep losing parts of her memories until her soul was a clean slate. What would she be like then? A rampaging monster? Something worse?
"No matter how hard I try I could never be able to bypass the wall that exists between the flesh and the soul, and I hardly believe anyone could too until I've found you."
The specialist glanced behind him, and as expected, the pearl was there again, floating, unmoving, as if begging for Sirius to kill its existence. But his sword hand stiffened at the thought. Why? Why now?
"... Is this really what's the best?"
When he asked the pearl, he expected silence, or even furious rage. But instead, he was met with a comforting glow.
With Victoria's voice ringing in his ear, he was steady.
"Alright, if that's what you want," Sirius said, turning to face the pearl, "Allow me to send you off."
Saying that there must be a better way to fight Living Quirks was just an excuse, a way for him to feel numb to his inadequateness by making himself think he cared about how he had done things for the past 10 years. He himself had to find a better way.
"You are better than a warhound."
One swift cut from his soul blade split the pearl in two with no resistance. And the white space was no more. Ending a soul's life was insultingly quick, that it was angering. He thought about Victoria again, wondering what face she'd make if he told her that he agreed with what she said about him. A bit of comfort entered Sirius' chest as he imagined her telling him another simple praise for doing so.
During all this though, he forgot that he had been pretty high up from the ground, and as the bridge-between-souls collapsed, he was back at the parking lot, almost 30 feet off the ground.
A Singularity's corpse changes in time, since they weren't purely biological beings. However, there was always a sort of oddity to their death; they don't necessarily disappear into thin air, but transmutate, leaving something behind that wasn't their corpse. The skeleton-monster that infected Cassie Thornn; that one turned into ash inside the pool. The sandstone-Chrysalis; that one too transmuted, hardening into actual sandstone.
And so the grip he had on the fly's body transmuted into a millions of tinier, dead flies, and he was falling onto Marianne-thing's flesh-dissolving skin.
"Shit!"
However, in just a nick a time, a loud "Got you!" saved him, and he was falling no more but submerged in a body of water that wasn't there before.
Fortunately for him, he didn't need to experience drowning again (he had plenty of that a couple days ago, after all). Waverider pulled him and the orb of water he occupied to the space above asphalt just next to the surviving Singularity, before releasing both of them with a single stopping thought.
"A-are you okay?" Waverider's panicked voice filled Sirius' water-filled ears, he could feel her footsteps approaching him on the puddled asphalt.
"I'm fine, thank you…" Sirius mumbled out through the sudden coldness that invaded him, "W-what about you?"
"Me?" Waverider's voice was almost shocked when he asked that. She knelt down before him, likely to take a closer look at the state of his being, "I can't thank you enough. I'm sure I could've died, if it weren't for you."
Sirius perked up, and suddenly seeing himself just inches away from the younger woman's face made him freeze completely. In an instant, he completely forgot about being drenched in water, whilst sitting on the asphalt parking lot, surrounded by thousands of dead flies.
"A-a-ah… W-well, it was nothing," He stuttered out, eyes gazing to the sky as if there was something there worth noting, "M-Mari… I mean… this Singularity here did most of the work."
"ℙ𝕖𝕣𝕔𝕖𝕡𝕥𝕚𝕧𝕖, 𝕒𝕣𝕖𝕟'𝕥 𝕪𝕠𝕦?"
Waverider gulped at the reminder of the other, well, thing, with them, "Y-yeah, of course. Thank you, umm, Marianne…?"
"𝔹𝕒𝕙!" The thing barked in disgust, even now Sirius wasn't sure how it could talk without any noticeable mouth, "ℂ𝕠𝕟𝕤𝕚𝕕𝕖𝕣 𝕚𝕥 𝕗𝕠𝕣𝕞𝕒𝕝𝕚𝕥𝕪, 𝕙𝕦𝕞𝕒𝕟."
It stood up from the asphalt, shaking and scratching its enormous head like a cat tending to its wound. Sirius watched as it started walking away from the scene without another word. He never could make out anything this beast was thinking, and felt it would be a shame to see it walk away like that, even if he knew he'd meet it and its human host again someday.
"Marianne!" He called out, only to be antagonized by the creature again in return.
"𝔻𝕠 𝕟𝕠𝕥 𝕔𝕒𝕝𝕝 𝕞𝕖 '𝕄𝕒𝕣𝕚𝕒𝕟𝕟𝕖', 𝕗𝕠𝕠𝕝!" Sirius and Waverider were bewildered at its response. The Singularity was silent for a moment, before turning it's gaze away from them once more, "... 𝕍𝕖𝕣𝕚𝕝𝕪, 𝕚𝕥 𝕖𝕤𝕔𝕒𝕡𝕖𝕤 𝕞𝕖 𝕨𝕙𝕪 𝕪𝕠𝕦'𝕕 𝕣𝕖𝕗𝕖𝕣 𝕥𝕠 𝕞𝕖 𝕨𝕚𝕥𝕙 𝕤𝕦𝕔𝕙 𝕒𝕟 𝕦𝕟𝕗𝕒𝕞𝕚𝕝𝕚𝕒𝕣 𝕟𝕒𝕞𝕖."
The specialist blinked to himself, a feeling of hurt started to form in his chest until he realized what the creature might be implying with its words.
"A-ah! Yes, of course, I… ummm… must've misheard…" Sirius started muttering gibberish uncontrollably, he wasn't really someone who could ad-lib anything to save his life, "S-sorry about that, uhh, Miss—Mister? Mister Singularity, sir…"
He could've sworn the beast was making a small giggle as it walked away, adding more to his embarrassment. It disappeared as it climbed up the tower once more and went around the edge until it was away from sight. He wished at that point, it was all the excitement he could possibly experience for the day.
"Umm…" Waverider's voice broke the silence created from Marianne-thing's absence, "I-I didn't get your name."
"S-Sirius—" He gulped to himself wondering if he should be saying the things he was saying.
Waverider scrunched her nose, "Just Sirius?"
The man made a face that was the equivalent of feeling shock and feeling guilt.
"Ah, right, sorry… I got ahead of myself. I thought you'd like me to put a good word to my superiors, but I guess you have your reasons," The heroine's gaze fell for a moment, as if musing on a new feeling of disappointment. Then she noticed Sirius' confused look, before chuckling to herself, "What, you thought I didn't know? I can tell, somewhat, about the cloth you're cut from."
"Ah, yeah…" Sirius nodded to himself. In a way he could share her sentiment, as surprised as he did, "I was… uhh..."
"The 'call for backup' thing? The way you fought?" The heroine reassured him with a smile. Even when she was still wearing her facemask, even when she still looked like she was recovering from the action, Sirius still felt an odd comforting radiance from her, "Don't worry, I won't tell."
Silence. Though, the two of them didn't feel quite alienated from one another in spite of it.
"I don't know what you'll do from here though," Waverider sighed, "The police will be here soon and they probably want some statements."
Sirius looked down towards the bug-filled asphalt, hearing the sirens at the back of his mind, "I'll deal with them, myself. It's alright."
"Oh. Haha! I guess you're pretty used to these things to say that so coolly!"
The specialist had to stop himself from turning his head towards the heroine, fearing that she'd see his flushed face.
"But really, thanks," She says again, "You're a hero!"
"No—" His reply was soft and almost hidden behind the movement of his lips, but it was quick… and it was unfinished.
Almost after she had mentioned it, a distant police siren could be heard, one that he hadn't imagined in his mind. Pedestrians were starting to crowd on the sidewalk across the high-rise, now that the fight had passed. Sirius was calming down, the adrenaline in his blood was starting to dissolve. He started thinking about what had come of Victoria and all the other businessmen before, whether or not they needed medical assistance or some such.
"I'll go check if there's any survivors!" Waverider instantly got to her feet, almost as if reading his mind, "Please stay here, sir! The police will be in a minute!"
The cylinder rattled against her back, spewing out small amounts of water that would then collect themselves right under the path of her running footsteps. She took flight, disappearing as quickly as she had appeared earlier. Sirius too felt the readiness in his joints, urging him to stand on his feet. He was still wet, but he'd rather take comfort in the fact that it was just regular water (or at least he hoped it was).
He fished out his phone, taking a moment to be glad that it didn't forcefully shut down from being submerged with him. Turn it on with a light click, and let the lock screen greet him with a single text from an unknown number.
ᵘⁿᵏⁿᵒʷⁿ [𝚃𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚒𝚜 𝚅𝚒𝚌𝚝𝚘𝚛𝚒𝚊.]
ᵘⁿᵏⁿᵒʷⁿ [𝚂𝚑𝚊𝚕𝚕 𝚠𝚎 𝚍𝚒𝚜𝚌𝚞𝚜𝚜 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚏𝚞𝚛𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚛?]
"You're a hero!"
Sirius smiled to himself, reminiscing at those words. A continuation of his words from before rolled off of his lips, "—But I think I have a chance now."
ʸᵒᵘ [𝚈𝚎𝚜]
Three new text messages popped up just as he replied.
ᵘⁿᵏⁿᵒʷⁿ [𝙸 𝚊𝚖 𝚐𝚕𝚊𝚍 𝚝𝚘 𝚑𝚎𝚊𝚛 𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚝.]
ᵘⁿᵏⁿᵒʷⁿ [𝚆𝚎 𝚠𝚒𝚕𝚕 𝚋𝚎 𝚒𝚗 𝚝𝚘𝚞𝚌𝚑.]
ᵘⁿᵏⁿᵒʷⁿ [𝚃𝚑𝚎 𝚘𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚜 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝙸 𝚠𝚎𝚕𝚌𝚘𝚖𝚎 𝚢𝚘𝚞, 𝙼𝚛. 𝚆𝚒𝚕𝚜𝚔.]
Sirius blinked, "Others?"
He briefly recalled Victoria mentioning something about people who could help her achieve a goal; not killers, but investigators—people who could study Living Quirks instead of annihilating them. His heart seemed to beat once in disappointment, like how people would feel once they think of themselves as second choices. But Sirius immediately brushed that thought of his away. It didn't matter if he was first choice, second choice, or third choice, he just needed to know if what he was doing was worth it.
He needed to know if he was worth it, not anybody else.
The coldness of September wind seeping into his wet coat wasn't enough to quench the warmth building with every beat of his ignited heart—
Brmmm…
[𝙷𝙾𝙽𝙾𝙺𝙰-𝚂𝙴𝙽𝚂𝙴𝙸 𝚒𝚜 𝙲𝚊𝚕𝚕𝚒𝚗𝚐…]
Brmmm…
"…"
Beep…
"Y-yes?"
"𝚆𝚑𝚢 𝚍𝚒𝚍𝚗'𝚝 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚙𝚒𝚌𝚔 𝚞𝚙 𝚢𝚘𝚞𝚛 𝚙𝚑𝚘𝚗𝚎?"
"I-I…"
"𝚆𝚑𝚊𝚝'𝚜 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚊𝚋𝚘𝚞𝚝 𝚊 𝚂𝚒𝚗𝚐𝚞𝚕𝚊𝚛𝚒𝚝𝚢 𝚊𝚝𝚝𝚊𝚌𝚔 𝚘𝚗 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚗𝚎𝚠𝚜?"
"That's…"
"𝙸 𝚝𝚛𝚒𝚎𝚍 𝚌𝚊𝚕𝚕𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝟽 𝚝𝚒𝚖𝚎𝚜."
"U-um…"
"𝙲𝚘𝚖𝚎 𝚑𝚘𝚖𝚎, 𝚗𝚘𝚠."
"Yes…"
The others and I welcome you, Mr. Wilsk. Send.
Victoria Stane placed her smartphone to her side, and let herself relax on the carseat.
"Sorry for having you stay behind, Origami."
The limousine jolted ever so lightly as it drove past the scenery hidden almost behind the tinted windows. At the mention of their name, the chauffeur lowered the window to the driver's seat. Their irritated stare was visible from the rear view mirror, even when they have the ability to literally change their entire face to fit any emotion.
"I'm glad I parked in the basement," They muttered loudly.
Victoria heard them and chuckled. Her gaze went past the window, a sudden choir of police sirens hummed past the direction of the limo, before disappearing faintly behind them.
"Will Mister Sirius be alright?"
The woman turned her head to the little girl to her side. Now in a new set of clothes, changed into it just a bit after she entered the vehicle, Marianne was back to her human—but perhaps not natural—form. Both her knees climbed onto the glossy leather seat, doing their best to support her short stature past the height of the carseat, all while she was staring forlornly at the distance behind them.
"I'm sure he will be," Victoria assured her with a smile, "I made sure that the police won't have a reason to keep him in custody for too long."
Neither will all the men she met up with earlier. In fact, she's sure by now all of them had gone home without helping themselves to the authorities' aid. After all, it'd be hard for a bunch of conglomerates, juries, and executives to explain their presence there without being suspected of lobbying.
But Marianne didn't need to know that.
"Custody?" Marianne blinked at the woman in confusion.
"Protection. Hmm, more like being grounded, you see."
The girl nodded to herself, "Ooh."
Marianne sat back down next to the older woman, and almost instantly her stomach began to rumble.
"Hungry?" Victoria asked, to which the girl nodded in response, "Origami, take us home, please."
"... You sure you don't want to get yourself checked up at the hospital?"
Victoria tilted her head, before finally seeing her reflection on the rear view mirror. Truly, saying that she had seen better days might not be enough to venerate the state she was in.
She was completely covered in dust and blood; the worst part of it being hers. Though she did make quick work of stopping the bleeding on some parts of her body with an available bandage she always had ready beforehand, it was apparent that it wasn't enough. The most grave wound she could make out from her reflection would be her right eye; she knew just by looking at the haphazard binding that circled around one side of her head that she needed professional help.
Yes, she knew that.
"It's alright," Victoria breathed out, "I'll call someone to the manor."
"Ma'am…"
"Someone ought to notice me in a hospital. I'd rather not deal with my assistants at the office for the remainder of the week," She added firmly.
"Anyone would notice a missing eye, you know," Origami sighed in defeat, "Fine. Honestly, I should probably realize you're unkillable by now…"
Victoria smiled again.
"Sorry… I couldn't protect miss…" Marianne said under her breath after a short silence. She was looking down at her hands.
"I will be fine, Marianne," Victoria said, "And everything went according to plan didn't it? You have nothing to worry about, Marianne. You did such a good job~"
She ran her bandaged and dusty hands softly over the little girl's head, careful to not dirty her raven hair with remnants of concrete and paint. It was almost supernatural how Marianne had gotten out of the whole debacle without so much as a scratch on her, and Victoria made no passing thought to ruin that now.
"Did I? Thank goodness…" Marianne said in relief, "𝔹𝕦𝕥 𝕕𝕠𝕟'𝕥 𝕞𝕚𝕤𝕥𝕒𝕜𝕖 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕒𝕤 𝕒 𝕔𝕠𝕞𝕡𝕝𝕖𝕥𝕖 𝕧𝕚𝕔𝕥𝕠𝕣𝕪, 𝕗𝕠𝕠𝕝."
Victoria's eyes wandered downwards at Marianne's sudden change of tone. That childhood innocence suddenly shifted tone into an otherworldly entity, the enigmatic pressure of the new occupant could be felt throughout the interior of the limo.
"𝕋𝕙𝕒𝕥 𝕨𝕣𝕖𝕥𝕔𝕙𝕖𝕕 𝕙𝕦𝕞𝕒𝕟 𝔻𝕚𝕒𝕫 𝕤𝕥𝕚𝕝𝕝 𝕝𝕚𝕧𝕖𝕤," Marianne turned her face towards Victoria, but it wasn't her face anymore. Her face was scrunched up, to a point where anger wasn't enough to describe the expression, and black roots were forming from the edges of her eyes like lightning bolt tears, "𝕋𝕙𝕒𝕥 𝕨𝕒𝕤𝕟'𝕥 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕡𝕒𝕣𝕥 𝕠𝕗 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕕𝕖𝕒𝕝. 𝕐𝕠𝕦 𝕡𝕣𝕠𝕞𝕚𝕤𝕖𝕕 𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕕𝕖𝕒𝕥𝕙 𝕚𝕟 𝕖𝕩𝕔𝕙𝕒𝕟𝕘𝕖 𝕥𝕙𝕒𝕥 𝕀 𝕗𝕚𝕘𝕙𝕥!"
"Terrance Diaz lived?" Origami asked from the driver's seat, hearing the conversation unfold.
"Yes. But I do not find that unfortunate," Victoria calmly replied, "I need all the votes I can get. That, and the fact that now we know Sirius Wilsk has not lost his touch. He took command of the battlefield and controlled the situation, saving everyone in the process, as expected of a hero turned soldier."
"Hmph," Origami scoffed, seemingly realizing she was personally jabbing at them.
"And it would've been too late to do so at the end anyway," Victoria added, her attention now placed upon the little monster beside her, "You already made too much of a fuss even as a 'good guy', it'll be harder to forge a testimony if you start killing too."
"Well we need to take care of Diaz quickly before he realizes the Singularity we baited was the former vice-president of his company," Origami commented.
"I know," A glacial tone flowed past the woman's mouth, "And I will. I will stand by my end of the bargain: everyone who wronged you in the past will die."
The Marianne-creature growled, showing the gums on Marianne's teeth, "ℂ𝕣𝕠𝕤𝕤 𝕞𝕖 𝕒𝕘𝕒𝕚𝕟, 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕀 𝕨𝕚𝕝𝕝 𝕜𝕚𝕝𝕝 𝕪𝕠𝕦, 𝕪𝕠𝕦 𝕡𝕠𝕤𝕙 𝕨𝕖𝕟𝕔𝕙!"
Victoria nodded, acknowledging its demands.
'Marianne' closed her eyes, her face seemingly loosened stress, and the black roots were pulling back into concealment behind the girl's eyelids. Then, the girl's head perked up again, the same childlike look that once disappeared had spread upon her face.
"Can we get something for Thanksgiving?"
"Of course! Anything you want," Victoria changed her demeanor once more, smiling innocently at the girl. Marianne leaned the top of her head to the older woman's shoulder, urging Victoria to pat her caringly once more.
"I still don't think it's wise to reveal you were a DA like that," Origami started after a period of silence, "Especially now that you're running for Senate."
"I told Sirius I was a lawyer," Victoria argued, "Besides, he'd realize it sooner or later. It's not exactly something I am planning to hide."
"Yeah well, just a heads up," Origami scoffed, "This is the same guy that suckerpunched the Secretary of Defense of all people 8 years ago, so… doesn't seem like the kind that'd like people in power. Just saying."
Victoria closed her eyes, letting the low, mechanical purring of the car's engine fill her head, calming the stinging pain on her front lobe.
"I am well prepared for that," She said, "I trust you've contacted the rest of the team for next week's mission?"
Origami's eyes wandered to the rear view mirror, letting their Cheshire gaze meet Victoria's, "Of course."
"Good."
Victoria felt a throb in the socket belonging to her missing right eye, the throbbing returning to her head, and what that meant wasn't lost on her: her heart was pumping in excitement.
"Tell them the good news."
Hong Kong, China
"—and to undermine the connection between that of Quirks and the soul is to undermine the importance of it in understanding the nature of The Singularity Effect."
The clicking and clacking of keyboards followed that melodious sleepy voice. Both drowned out only by a little from the cacophony of airplane engine hums, air conditioner whooshes, and human conversations.
"Aaand save," A woman sitting in one of the occupied seats said to herself gleefully. She double checked her internal folders, eyes scanning over the document titled with her name: Grace Ulster.
She stretched her arms upwards, finally experiencing that sweet muscular release. Her sleeves nudged past the vibrant red curliness that made up her hair. The motion made her glasses jolt, but it never really truly sat in place anyway; she was a jittery type, and even after finishing all sorts of work the woman just couldn't be more temperate.
"You finally done with that?"
Another feminine voice entered the cozy and almost claustrophobic airline space, coming from the seat right next to Grace. She was a contrasting sort of lady, at least to the occupant beside her who was the striking image of modernity; cowboy hat tipped forward just enough to hide the owner of the voice's face, one that had a silverish hair framing it, with the rest of her body decorated with a red flannel over a simple white shirt, complimenting the southern drawl that dripped from her lips.
The redhair blinked twice, then after seeing the cowgirl's eyes peeking at her from underneath her hat, she smiled mischievously.
"Nope. Just the draft," Grace giggled, "Hey Mira—"
"Codenames, Phantasm…" The cowgirl scolded
"Whatever! Look at this!" Grace brushed her off, letting the southerner wallow in the redhead's carelessness with their real names, before turning her laptop to face her companion, "What do you think of this title? Kōsei: The Japanese Approach to Individuality Through Supernaturalism."
Mira—her Southern companion—didn't seem too keen on indulging the redhead, "What, that thing? Thought you're workin' on the report for Handler…"
"I'm gonna! I'm gonna! Just tell me that first!" Grace insisted, "Prof' needs it before tomorrow, I can work on the report later!"
Mira only stared at her, still lazily staying in her slouched position, "I'unno, I guess it's interestin'…"
"Ugh, you could at least be more specific!" The redhair pouted.
"M'sorry, I ain't even read the damn thing, yet. S'not as if I can make somethin' up on the spot," The cowgirl yawned. She brought her right hand up to cover her yawning mouth, showing the partly bandaged and calloused fingers, "And I'm a bit tired, anyways. That last Singularity roughed me up pretty bad."
"You mean the Grasschopper?"
Mira gave the redhead a side-eye, "We really going to name every Livin' Quirk we fight?"
"What, you prefer XYZ-123 or however the hell those government types name Singularities?" Grace rolled her eyes as she started working on her laptop once more.
"You know I don't," Mira scoffed, before turning to speak to no one in particular, "Ain't that right, Effy?"
Silence answered her, yet she kept acting as if someone did.
"Haah, let's go get a hot springs reservation or somethin' after we go back home," The cowgirl said, eyes brimming with eagerness. Something told Grace that Mira wasn't talking to her.
Instead of another silence, a new voice blared through the speakers above the two women.
"𝙻𝚊𝚍𝚒𝚎𝚜 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚐𝚎𝚗𝚝𝚕𝚎𝚖𝚎𝚗, 𝚠𝚎𝚕𝚌𝚘𝚖𝚎 𝚘𝚗𝚋𝚘𝚊𝚛𝚍 𝙵𝚕𝚒𝚐𝚑𝚝 𝟼𝙰𝟾 𝚠𝚒𝚝𝚑 𝚜𝚎𝚛𝚟𝚒𝚌𝚎 𝚏𝚛𝚘𝚖 𝙷𝚘𝚗𝚐 𝙺𝚘𝚗𝚐 𝚝𝚘 𝙿𝚑𝚘𝚎𝚗𝚒𝚡. 𝚆𝚎 𝚊𝚛𝚎 𝚌𝚞𝚛𝚛𝚎𝚗𝚝𝚕𝚢 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚛𝚍 𝚒𝚗 𝚕𝚒𝚗𝚎 𝚏𝚘𝚛 𝚝𝚊𝚔𝚎-𝚘𝚏𝚏 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚊𝚛𝚎 𝚎𝚡𝚙𝚎𝚌𝚝𝚎𝚍 𝚝𝚘 𝚋𝚎 𝚒𝚗 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚊𝚒𝚛 𝚒𝚗 𝚊𝚙𝚙𝚛𝚘𝚡𝚒𝚖𝚊𝚝𝚎𝚕𝚢 𝚜𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚗 𝚖𝚒𝚗𝚞𝚝𝚎𝚜 𝚝𝚒𝚖𝚎. 𝚆𝚎 𝚊𝚜𝚔 𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚝 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚙𝚕𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚎 𝚏𝚊𝚜𝚝𝚎𝚗 𝚢𝚘𝚞𝚛 𝚜𝚎𝚊𝚝𝚋𝚎𝚕𝚝𝚜 𝚊𝚝 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚝𝚒𝚖𝚎 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚜𝚎𝚌𝚞𝚛𝚎 𝚊𝚕𝚕 𝚋𝚊𝚐𝚐𝚊𝚐𝚎 𝚞𝚗𝚍𝚎𝚛𝚗𝚎𝚊𝚝𝚑 𝚢𝚘𝚞𝚛 𝚜𝚎𝚊𝚝 𝚘𝚛 𝚒𝚗 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚘𝚟𝚎𝚛𝚑𝚎𝚊𝚍 𝚌𝚘𝚖𝚙𝚊𝚛𝚝𝚖𝚎𝚗𝚝𝚜."
"Ugh, glad that whole dilly-dally's over," Mira grumbled as the chittering of the other passengers started to fill her ears once more, "Can't believe I spent all that time studyin' Mandarin for nothin'…. Just a bunch'a critters and not even a sign of the infection. Hope the others got a better time."
"Chin up! Hey, at least we solved a centuries old mystery," Grace nudged her companion with her shoulder, to which the latter retreated in mild annoyance.
"What matter s'it make if the glowing baby story was a bunch of phony rumors," Mira said, "Doesn't take us closer to our goal, neither!"
Grace giggled at the prospect. The last few months spent overseas being summarized with such an unflattering phrase was funny to think about to say the least. But her southern companion was not wrong, it didn't bring them closer to the goal.
"You know, I love rumors," The redhead began, her eyes shifting back to her laptop, "They tend to tell a bit more truth, more than hard facts do."
She shifted through folders after folders, a single index finger running above the keypad mechanically as she did. Mira turned her head to the redhead, and she saw Grace's expression change. Thinking face, Mira liked to call it.
Text documents, images, Grace scanned through them like a computer herself, all with a look that was slowly becoming more and more indulged into the screen of her mobile computer.
"'The glowing baby story is fabricated' and 'there exists a Quirk user even older than the glowing baby' for example. Two truths we can find from one rumor," Grace explained. She was tapping her index finger on the palm rest like a maniac.
"The rumor could be wrong," Mira interjected, "The baby could still be the first Quirk user."
"Mira, the village that the glowing baby came from didn't remember they existed!" Grace spun her head to the side quickly, almost surprising Mira, raising her voice to the point it almost seemed like she was offended that her companion couldn't see the bigger picture, "Sure, you could argue it was isolation, but come on! The story is popular literally everywhere else in the world!"
Mira didn't exactly feel like arguing, anyway, "... I think you're readin' too much into this."
"And if someone could spread that lie to the entire world… maybe the Singularity that can create Singularities was also a lie…" Grace suddenly started muttering, "And we came all the way to Hong Kong for nothing…"
The two didn't seemingly share the same resulting sentiment from the time they both spent working together. Where Grace kept a rather firm everything-must-conclude outlook, which may or may not lead to her becoming ever-so absorbed in thought, Mira liked to place herself on the present unyieldingly.
"Oh it exists, alright…" The southerner placed both her hands behind her head as a cushion, letting herself relax at her own particular contemplation, "'Hierarchy' and stuff… even a wolf gotta think about more than the pack…"
There was a certain feeling of hunger in her tone, perhaps a mixture of the disappointment and tiredness that resulted from days upon days of unending work, and a personal goal left unfulfilled.
"I will never understand your weird idioms," The redhead seemed to have regained her own composure at her companion's enigmatic attitude. Grace went on to work on her laptop again moments later, "Alright, Handler has my report."
"There're things best learned through experience, lass. Not just plain old smarts," The cowgirl smirked to herself one more time just to irk the redhead, before proceeding to go back to her slouching position, "Anyhows… Wake me up when we get to Phoenix."
A soft ding! could be heard.
"Oh wow, that was quick," Grace blinked at the message notification she received, "Handler has a day off or something?"
"Heh, who would'a guess, next thing you know pigs'll start flyin'!" Mira let out a hearty laugh, eyes already gone under the brim of her cowboy hat.
"Maybe not pigs," Grace responded as she scanned the contents of her message, making a pause for dramatic effect, knowing how her companion would react if she were to see the message herself, "But us. We'll be flying again to New York."
Mira shot up on her seat with an incredulous "Wha'?"
"Lady and Waxen came out with nothing too," Grace told her, eyes still glued to her laptop screen, "Said we'll have to regroup in 2 days."
Mira's mouth was hanging on loose hinges, seemingly at unease at the prospect of work in her state.
"Oh, hells… Y'know, one a' these days I'm gonna tell Handler what's what. Workin' me to the bone…" She said in irritation, her accent becoming more grating by every word. Until suddenly something seemed to catch her ear, "Hmm? What's that?"
Mira turned her head to the direction of her own torso, hidden under a thick layer of buttoned up black-colored duster coat, before starting to speak directly towards it.
"Effy, the boss' like one of them robots or somethin'," The cowgirl chuckled, not even attempting a hushed tone, "You think someone like her understands the word 'vacation'? We give her an inch, she'll take a whole damn mile!"
Again, silence answered her.
"Yeah, I wanna fight too, but lately Miss Handler just got us runnin' around on a goose chase like a pair of coyotes," Mira suddenly raised her voice, arguing with thin air, "And we got plans at home, remember?"
Grace only stared at the scene unfolding as if already used to it.
"Well, when ya put it like that, Effy…" Mira scratched the back of her neck, humming to herself in contemplation, before sighing in defeat, "Golly... Well, fine. Hope Origami got us new replacement recruits soon. Maybe them folks can find a fight worth fighting."
Then it was Grace's turn to cut into the conversation, "Oh, don't worry about that. We have them."
The cowgirl glanced at the redhead, "Seriously?"
"Yep. The sword-dude and the office lady," Grace's eyes were glued to the screen of her laptop, which had presented new messages on her showing her chat logs, "We're going to meet them during the briefing."
Grace played around with her touchpad, clicking on pictures sent to her laptop.
"Ooh, look at you, Miss office lady~" She awed to herself as her eyes landed upon a newer image in her gallery, "That hairdo is just so… ugh~!"
"What, so some kinda greenie celebration party?" Mira interjected the redhead's swooning.
Another ding! interrupted Mira's train of thoughts.
"Oh, and I bet you'll love this," Grace said as she read another message, "Victoria got a lead on an Apostle. And all of us are tasked to investigate."
Mira was quiet for a couple of seconds, "Gotta be a strong one if Handler's sending the entire hunting party…"
The redhead slowly turned to her, giving a smirk that she just knew would bait the southerner, "What do you think?"
"Jeez, Phantasm, you should've said that from the start!" Mira said to herself as she stared at the redhead's enthusiastic expression, feeling herself infected with the same gleefulness, "So the whole team's going together with the greenhorns, eh? Sounds fuckin' fun. Alright, I guess I can do one more fightin'. Right, Effy?"
The southerner then guffawed loudly making her aisle seat shake, even when nothing seemed to have responded to her.
"I know, right!" Mira said to herself again, before turning to the redhead beside her, "What do you say, Phantasm? Think you're up for one more investigation?"
The atmosphere seemed to have gotten heavier around the redhead as Grace's smile slowly spread from ear to ear. Her eyes were still pointed towards the screen of her laptop, yet it was clear that the vision she was seeing was something more fantastical.
"New recruits and a chance to study Singularities, finally?"
She brought her thumb to her mouth and lightly bit on it, like a physical effort done to prevent herself from doing something drastic.
"Are you kidding? I can't wait to discover more of their truth."
New York, US
"Dear Rosalyn Bayliff…"
Oh, she just knew where this was going.
"It is with our greatest displeasure… in the following dates…"
Her eyes trailed over and over and over again on every line, her reading comprehension slowly but surely failing her. Well, it wasn't as if she didn't know what was happening to her; she was holding the reason in her hand in a glass of rocks.
"In the following dates, you will be… y-you will be terminated from…"
Rosa couldn't do this, not in the state she was in. By that she meant she wasn't drunk enough, as she could still feel the guilt tightening around her heart; she would rather not. She took one more swig.
"... Terminated from employment at Euclidean Pharmaceuticals…"
There were still half of the letter in her hand still unread, but most of it was formal corporate obligation stuff she was all too familiar with; entitlement, coverage, agreements, and the likes she could think about in the morning tomorrow. Rosa let the fumes of alcohol, the chill of the air-freshen AC, and the distant TV noises of the usual news anchor covering the latest Singularity attack (An attack on a high-rise? Glad she was not in Manhattan then) take her into the Neverland she was second-most familiar with—one that wasn't shaped like a pristine, high-society office.
"Euclidean, huh?"
The invading voice pulled Rosa into an irritated stupor, the last thing she needed was a nosy bartender.
"That-a big name you got done from," The mustached bartender said in a thick Italian accent. Rosa didn't look up, but knew the bartender was practically wiggling his eyebrows, "Must be pretty difficult, eh?"
"Hah? Difficult?" Rosa snarled. Oh, how she missed being free of her public-relations smiles and handshakes, "I don't regret a thing! These assholes can go fuck themselves!"
Taken aback, the bartender changed his approach, "O-oh, sorry. Just thought most people would be, ahem, distraught with such news."
"What do 'most people' know anyway," Rosa bit back. She crumpled the letter in her hand and threw it past her shoulder, not caring where it landed, "Can most people work on accounting for 7 years straight?! No! Can people handle crunch time work hours, 5 days a week?! No! Can people keep their cool when their stupid boss says something stupid and…"
"You're keeping money from our clients!"
"... And refrain themselves f-from… from talking back, and…"
"Aren't we supposed to be an insurance company?!"
"..."
"Aren't we supposed to be helping people?!"
A moment passed, before she headbutted the countertop, hard.
Everyone else near and even far from her heard the painful thud and took a glance at the lady in office attire just laying there on the countertop motionless, making the bartender across from her to stiffen at the sudden stares.
"U-umm, Miss…. If it's any consolation, I don't believe it was your fault…" The mustached bartender practically whispered at her face-down figure, wishing she'd take the hint and quiet down. She didn't.
"Huh?! Whuzzat?! You think it's my fault?!" The office lady suddenly shot her bright red and drunk face up, "What do you know, buddy?! Huh?!"
"N-no! I said I believe it wasn't your fault!" The bartender lifted his hands up, hoping she'd calm down. She didn't.
"That's right! It's not my fault!" Rosa's foot was now up the countertop. Already she was a relatively tall woman, and now she was towering over everyone else, "It's the system, see?! The system!"
She didn't seem like she knew what she was talking about; heavens knew the bartender certainly didn't, but he tried to quell the fire anyway even when it seemed like the office lady was just grasping at hypothetical straws.
"I-I get it, I get it," The bartender said to her as he frantically waved his hands to beg her to sit down, "Please, miss! You need to keep it down! B-but you're right—it's not your fault, okay? Whatever you did, t-they probably deserve it, eh?"
"They… hmm…" Rosa squinted her eyes at the bartender for a moment. Slowly, one foot by another, she stepped off of the seat and the table sat back down properly, "Yeah, they did…"
"Yes, it was them okay? Not you, eh? In fact, even if you were responsible, which I'm not saying you are, ehe, they probably lost a-an important person too, right? So serve them right, right?"
The office lady was in thought for a moment, and she was finally silent. Unbeknownst to her, the bartender was signaling to the bouncer—who had just entered the room wondering what all the commotion was about—that everything was under control, thankfully.
"Yeah… serve them right," Rosa gripped the glass tighter, eyes digging into the gleaming ice cube bouncing inside the cupping of her hand. And nope, she wasn't going to take responsibility for her actions. Hell no! At this point, why not just blame someone else! "It's that stupid Origami!"
The mustached bartender shot her a horrified look when she bursted with anger once more, "Origami? Like the paper?"
"No! Not like the paper!" Rosa barked, "Like a… like a… W-well, like a really persistent and annoying thing that had been bugging me these past few months!"
rrriiingg…
"Bugging me! Like a lice on my hair! But the lice is Origami and the hair is my thoughts—"
rrriiingg…
"Bugging me, like a… like a…"
rrriiingg…
"Oh, for the love of—!"
Rosa reached into the space beside her stool chair, where a leather laptop purse-bag was sitting and being ignored by the owner for almost the remainder of the evening. Her well manicured hand dived into it's half unzipped mouth, before fishing out her phone with just one quick pull.
"Shit… it's mom…" Her words were quick to the cut and cold, knowing that she wasn't in the mood to be formal and didn't plan on faking it either. Though, she was sober enough to recognize contact names, at least, "Well… uh, guess I gotta go. Thanks for today. Appreciate it."
The bartender blinked once, twice, before realizing he was being addressed to with such semi-professionalism from the woman, "Ah, eh, no… t-thank you?"
Rosa hung up her phone without picking up the ring, before texting something to who the bartender guessed to be her mother.
"A-ah, Miss, you need to pay first," The bartender called just as Rosa was getting off of her stool with her purse, half-fearing he might get yelled at again.
But then, the office lady turned to the mustached man with a smile, "I'll be going by train, so keep it on my tab, like always."
The bartender stared at her, "What?"
"What's the matter?" Rosa cocked her eyebrow at the bartender's confusion, "Just give me 2 days like always, I'll pay it back."
"But I've never met you before."
"Eh?"
"Huh?"
In the end, Rosa paid everything in her wallet, and then some by card. She left the bar after apologizing for the mixup, not minding the stares following her as she walked out, and found herself immediately at the busy dusk colored streets of Brooklyn.
The office lady sighed into the dark greyish sky, leaving a wisp of warmness on the winter air. She pulled a bang from her brunette bobcut behind her ear, letting flustered ears cool. Instinctively, Rosa walked away from the crowd and from the headache inducing hues of neon streetlights, restaurants, bars, and cars, contrasted with the fading sunlight, to a path she wasn't all too familiar with but still chose to tread it in an attempt to escape the strenuous night
Alcohol went down her system fast; it wasn't practice or any of the sort, hell, she wasn't even that heavy a drinker, it was just how she was. And because of it, as she kept walking, the sobriety of her mind was starting to hit her with unpleasant thoughts, including the events that procured before, and the anxiety of what might come next.
rrriiingg…
She picked up the phone, sighed, and answered, "Haaah… Yes?"
There was another thing too: the present, which she'd rather not deal with nor had the mood to connect with at the moment.
"𝙸𝚜 𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚝 𝚊 𝚠𝚊𝚢 𝚝𝚘 𝚝𝚊𝚕𝚔 𝚝𝚘 𝚢𝚘𝚞𝚛 𝚖𝚘𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚛, 𝚢𝚘𝚞𝚗𝚐 𝚕𝚊𝚍𝚢?"
"Mom… I'm busy…" Rosa stopped walking. The state of her mind wasn't enough to support a phone call, a stupor at once, and physical exertion, all at once.
"𝚆𝚎𝚕𝚕, 𝚢𝚘𝚞'𝚛𝚎 𝚗𝚘𝚝 𝚋𝚞𝚜𝚢 𝚗𝚘𝚠 𝚊𝚛𝚎 𝚢𝚘𝚞?" The elderly voice interjected. A special sort of venom was dripping from every word.
The office lady paced around her surroundings; an asphalt path alleyway confined by two similar brick buildings from each side, "What is it, mom?"
"𝙷𝚘𝚠 𝚛𝚞𝚍𝚎. 𝙸 𝚓𝚞𝚜𝚝 𝚠𝚊𝚗𝚝𝚎𝚍 𝚝𝚘 𝚜𝚎𝚎 𝚑𝚘𝚠 𝚖𝚢 𝚍𝚊𝚞𝚐𝚑𝚝𝚎𝚛 𝚒𝚜 𝚍𝚘𝚒𝚗𝚐!"
Rosa rolled her eyes, and didn't say anything in response. She would rather argue anything else but that.
"𝚆𝚑𝚎𝚗 𝚊𝚛𝚎 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚌𝚘𝚖𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚑𝚘𝚖𝚎 𝚝𝚘𝚖𝚘𝚛𝚛𝚘𝚠?"
"Tomorrow?"
"𝚆𝚎𝚕𝚕, 𝚢𝚘𝚞'𝚛𝚎 𝚘𝚋𝚟𝚒𝚘𝚞𝚜𝚕𝚢 𝚗𝚘𝚝 𝚌𝚘𝚖𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚑𝚘𝚖𝚎 𝚏𝚘𝚛 𝚝𝚘𝚗𝚒𝚐𝚑𝚝'𝚜 𝚃𝚑𝚊𝚗𝚔𝚜𝚐𝚒𝚟𝚒𝚗𝚐," Her mom said with a sarcastic scoff, "𝚂𝚘 𝚢𝚘𝚞'𝚕𝚕 𝚋𝚎 𝚌𝚘𝚖𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚑𝚘𝚖𝚎 𝚏𝚘𝚛 𝚃𝚑𝚊𝚗𝚔𝚜𝚐𝚒𝚟𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚝𝚘𝚖𝚘𝚛𝚛𝚘𝚠!"
"Mom… I—"
"𝙾𝚑, 𝚖𝚘𝚖! 𝙸𝚜 𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚝 𝚁𝚘𝚜𝚒𝚎? 𝙿𝚕𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚎 𝚙𝚊𝚜𝚜 𝚖𝚎 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚙𝚑𝚘𝚗𝚎! 𝙿𝚕𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚎! 𝙿𝚕𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚎!"
"𝙾𝚑! 𝙶𝚘𝚘𝚍𝚗𝚎𝚜𝚜 𝚖𝚎, 𝙼𝚒𝚕𝚕𝚢—!"
There was a slight static on the other end of the call, as if the phone her mother used to dial her was caught in a disturbance, until a newer, younger voice was suddenly on the line instead.
"𝚁𝚘𝚜𝚒𝚎𝚎𝚎! 𝙷𝚒𝚒𝚒!"
"Mills…"
For some reason, Rosa had never felt so comforted by the sudden appearance of that particular voice in the 26 years she had been alive. She sat down on the sidewalk with her shoes tapping the quiet and crowdless asphalt.
"𝙷𝚎𝚢, 𝚓𝚞𝚜𝚝 𝚜𝚘 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚛𝚎𝚖𝚎𝚖𝚋𝚎𝚛 𝚗𝚎𝚡𝚝 𝚝𝚒𝚖𝚎; 𝚖𝚘𝚖 𝚍𝚘𝚎𝚜𝚗'𝚝 𝚕𝚒𝚔𝚎 𝚝𝚘 𝚋𝚎 𝚙𝚞𝚝 𝚘𝚗 𝚑𝚘𝚕𝚍 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚕𝚎𝚏𝚝 𝚘𝚗 𝚝𝚎𝚡𝚝!" Mills scolded through the other line.
"I remember, I remember," Rosa chuckled, "It's just that I was…"
She stopped, wondering what she should say.
Rosa could just feel Mills cocking her head cutely to the side, "𝙷𝚖𝚖? 𝚆𝚑𝚊𝚝 𝚠𝚊𝚜 𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚝?"
"Nothing. I was busy with work," Rosa lied. Then, she decided to change the topic away from herself, "Umm… how are you? How's the guy?"
"𝙼𝚎? 𝙸'𝚖 𝚏𝚒𝚗𝚎! 𝙸'𝚖 𝚏𝚒𝚗𝚎! 𝙰𝚗𝚍 𝙰𝚕𝚋𝚎𝚛𝚝'𝚜 𝚍𝚘𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚜𝚘𝚖𝚎 𝚌𝚘𝚘𝚔𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚛𝚒𝚐𝚑𝚝 𝚗𝚘𝚠 𝚠𝚒𝚝𝚑 𝚍𝚊𝚍," Mills said, "𝚂𝚙𝚎𝚊𝚔𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚘𝚏 𝚠𝚑𝚒𝚌𝚑, 𝚠𝚑𝚎𝚗 𝚊𝚛𝚎 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚌𝚘𝚖𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚑𝚘𝚖𝚎?"
"Ah, well, see… that's the thing," Shit, what excuse should she come up with? Rosa did have a habit of rubbing her temple whenever she was trying to think hard through stress; and the stress right then being the incomplete sobriety of her brain, "I-I sorta can't… I've got like a paperwork thing tomorrow, yeah…"
"𝚈𝚘𝚞 𝚓𝚞𝚜𝚝 𝚍𝚘𝚗'𝚝 𝚠𝚊𝚗𝚝 𝚝𝚘 𝚌𝚘𝚖𝚎 𝚑𝚘𝚖𝚎, 𝚍𝚘 𝚢𝚘𝚞?" Mills' voice was flat, and Rosa was immediately shut up. She should've known her sister would be the best out of her family to sniff her out.
"No! What? Come on, it's not like that!" Rosa angrily scoffed, trying to sound as confused as possible, "Look, it's just that—I mean, I go home every spring break anyway, so like, there's no reason for me to come home just for 1 day, right?"
"𝙽𝚘, 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚑𝚊𝚟𝚎 𝚝𝚘 𝚌𝚘𝚖𝚎 𝚑𝚘𝚖𝚎, 𝚁𝚘𝚜𝚒𝚎," Mills was becoming more stern. Rosa didn't like a stern Mills, "𝙰𝚗𝚍 𝚒𝚝'𝚜 𝚗𝚘𝚝 𝚓𝚞𝚜𝚝 𝚃𝚑𝚊𝚗𝚔𝚜𝚐𝚒𝚟𝚒𝚗𝚐, 𝚊𝚕𝚛𝚒𝚐𝚑𝚝? 𝚆𝚎'𝚛𝚎 𝚌𝚎𝚕𝚎𝚋𝚛𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚜𝚘𝚖𝚎𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚎𝚕𝚜𝚎 𝚝𝚘𝚘, 𝚜𝚘 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚑𝚊𝚟𝚎 𝚝𝚘 𝚋𝚎 𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚋𝚢 𝚝𝚘𝚖𝚘𝚛𝚛𝚘𝚠."
"... Something else? W-what do you mean something else?"
"𝚁𝚘𝚜𝚒𝚎, 𝙸'𝚖 𝚙𝚛𝚎𝚐𝚗𝚊𝚗𝚝."
The office lady was on her feet again, "... Congrats."
"𝚈𝚎𝚊𝚑, 𝚢𝚎𝚊𝚑, 𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚗𝚔𝚜 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚠𝚑𝚊𝚝𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚛, 𝚍𝚞𝚖𝚋𝚊𝚜𝚜. 𝙸 𝚗𝚎𝚎𝚍 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎!" The pressure of Mills' voice was even stronger now, "𝙻𝚘𝚘𝚔, 𝚁𝚘𝚜𝚒𝚎, 𝚒𝚝'𝚜 𝚓𝚞𝚜𝚝 𝚘𝚗𝚎 𝚍𝚊𝚢, 𝚙𝚕𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚎? 𝙸-𝙸'𝚟𝚎 𝚊𝚕𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚍𝚢 𝚜𝚎𝚝 𝚞𝚙 𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚛𝚢𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚐, 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝙸 𝚠𝚊𝚜 𝚐𝚘𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚝𝚘 𝚍𝚘 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚜𝚞𝚛𝚙𝚛𝚒𝚜𝚎 𝚙𝚛𝚎𝚐𝚗𝚊𝚗𝚌𝚢 𝚙𝚊𝚛𝚝𝚢 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚐, 𝚋𝚞𝚝 𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚗 𝙸 𝚑𝚎𝚊𝚛𝚍 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚠𝚎𝚛𝚎𝚗'𝚝 𝚌𝚘𝚖𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚝𝚘𝚗𝚒𝚐𝚑𝚝 𝚜𝚘… 𝚏𝚞𝚌𝚔 𝚒𝚝! 𝚈𝚘𝚞 𝚑𝚊𝚟𝚎 𝚝𝚘 𝚋𝚎 𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎; 𝚝𝚘𝚖𝚘𝚛𝚛𝚘𝚠!"
Without realizing it, Rosa replied, "... I'll try."
"𝙷𝚎𝚑𝚎𝚑. 𝚃𝚑𝚊𝚝'𝚜 𝚖𝚢 𝚁𝚘𝚜𝚒𝚎!" Mills said smugly, her voice then suddenly sounded like it became further and further away from the speaker, "𝙼𝚘𝚖! 𝙸 𝚍𝚒𝚍 𝚒𝚝! 𝚂𝚑𝚎'𝚜 𝚌𝚘𝚖𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚝𝚘𝚖𝚘—"
The line cut off suddenly, but Rosa didn't have anything else to say anyway. She was completely frozen on where she had stood, unmoving for a couple seconds. Her sister was pregnant. Wait, for how long, again? She didn't say— Ah, well, that's probably going to be the surprise, Rosa thought to herself.
And then now, as her sobriety reached the maximum point it needed to fill her entirely with the crushing realization that she might have to support her niece, or her nephew, or both, Rosa started to silently panic.
Until a thought crossed her mind, in the form of a disembodied voice of a person who could change their faces at will. A disembodied voice with a name.
"Are you satisfied with something like this? Don't you want to do something more?"
Slowly, Rosa put her phone back into her purse, and sat down again at the edge of the sidewalk. The lady sat there, while she kept rummaging at her purse, until she drew a single white business card from within.
She stared at it, with both hands holding both ends of the card. Motionless, now for longer than a few seconds.
"... Better be worth it."
The train she was supposed to be on would have left the station by now.
London, UK
"Mathias?"
"What is it?
"Come here. I have a message from Victoria."
From the darkness, the smell of foul rain and rot, and the echoing sounds of water droplets and nearby skittering critters, a man emerged. As if beckoned, by a feminine voice, soft, breathy, and cold, he walked obediently towards it, to the brighter side of the wretched space he resided in, revealing his form in wet leather trench coat.
He was tall and slim, straight black hair with orange tips framed his grimy and sullen expression. The sewer-ish environment did not help his appearance, in fact, it was most likely the reason why he was covered in so much filth and sweat. Though none of the elements of his surroundings seemed to have affected him personally, judging by his stone-faced expression, treading through the ankle deep, miasmatic water around his boots was nothing but a usual jog for him. A gray bolt action rifle hung by his hip on a simple strap, encircling the outside of his trench coat, lightly clicking from momentum as the man walked.
The man came into the halt under a large opening at the ceiling. He looked up, and took note of asphalts, concrete, and large metal rebars, all caved in into the space under it. He harrumphed at the sight, feeling a sense of familiarity and nostalgia, almost forgetting what he was doing.
A moving figure appeared in the corner of his eye, catching his attention, but not his alert. He knew this ethereal, but beautifully human figure. Draped in partly Victorian, and furnished with combat attire fitting for the environment she was in, a white haired woman stepped into view on top of what appeared to be an overturned subway cart, submerged partly in accumulated rainwater for what looked like years. Mathias' face softened at the sight of her, and responded in friendliness.
"Oh? Well, go on, then," The man called Mathias said as he faced the figure completely, "Is it about an Apostle?"
The woman nodded, "Yes."
Mathias sighed softly under his breath in relief. "That's good, I had enough fighting mooks for the past few weeks."
He glanced past his shoulder, to the darkness he emerged from, and took note of the deformed shape outlined just at the edge of the shadows. It wasn't human, but it was large, hard to kill, and fortunately dead. Little by little, the outline of the creature started to chafe away into space, like dust being blown into the wind. Giving view to the many other dead shapes and things behind it, some of which submerged under the water or hidden behind the shade of the darkness.
"Another few days in the abandoned London Metro with nothing but things that can't speak and I'll be losing my mind," He tried to joke, wondering if it fell flat when nobody responded. He shifted his gaze from the massacre behind him, "What about you?"
"I'm done here too," The woman said. Eyes gazing down, darkening her face, "Matt, there was something else."
"Oh? Did you find something on the Living Quirks?" Mathias said with his head perked up in curiosity, only to be shot down quickly, much to his enthusiasm.
"It's not that, Matt," The woman jumped down from where she stood, landing on her feet at the ankle deep water, and walked towards Mathias, "She found him."
Mathias quirked his eyebrow, "Freesia? What do you mean?"
"... Sirius Wilsk. She found him."
The woman—Freesia—stared at Mathias with emerald hued eyes of longing, as if she was staring past the man in front of her and was looking at nothing but memories… one that Mathias did not share.
"Freesia, hey. Let's focus on that later," Mathias interjected, closing his distance to the woman, "As much as I know how important this is for you, finding an Apostle is the most important for now, alright?"
Freesia's mouth closed at the sight of his approaching, just as she was about to interject, "... You're right. It's just… it's been so long."
"You're worried," Mathias said in a matter of fact kind of tone, "It'll be alright, I'm sure Sirius is well. He's survived this long in hiding, that means he's still got his strength."
When the woman looked up to face the taller man, she found herself looking at his rather softened smiling expression.
"Remember you saying that?" Mathias said, letting her reminisce, "I still get jealous sometimes, you know. Being compared to the Sword Saint like that."
Freesia stifled a soft laugh, "You're right…. I bet he doesn't even remember me."
A moment passed, an opportunity for Mathias to shift the conversation, "This'll be the first time in months since our first encounter with an Apostle. Is this info legit?"
"Don't know, we'll have to regroup at the safehouse in two days for a briefing."
"Two days?" Mathias grimaced, "We'll lose the track by then. I think it's better if we ask Stane straight and go after it ourselves."
"I think Victoria made a sound decision," Freesia said, eyes wandering to the darkness around them, "Two days is hardly enough time for a Singularity to move that far. And the last time we acted too hastily, we were read. And we lost two people."
Mathias let his hands rest on his hips, feeling a tad bit unsatisfied with the answer but couldn't quite refute it, "Still…"
"Don't worry. The new recruits will be there, including Sirius," Now the woman turned to face him, with a determined look etched on her porcelain-like face, "I have faith in them. With the people we have now, we won't be caught by surprise. I'm sure of it."
The sound of water droplets from pipes and ceiling holes were slowly becoming louder and louder as the silence between them grew.
"Shepherd and Phantasm came out with nothing from their trip in China?" Mathias asked, trying to shift the conversation once more, seeing the opportunity to enunciate his concern.
"I'm not sure, probably not," Freesia said as she lifted her left hand to show the smartwatch at her wrist. It turned on at the right angle, showing chat logs she had just not long ago, "We didn't get anything here in London, I doubt Hong Kong is any different."
"That's true."
Mathias paced around the water, the splashing of his footsteps were getting louder, and so was the clicking and clacking from his rifle; he was irritated.
"That damn monster got us running around in circles."
"We don't know that," Freesia reprimanded, hoping he'd calm down, "Hong Kong and London are just the two places with the highest probability of finding it. Doesn't mean the other smaller places we didn't check are going to be the same."
"London has the highest cases of sudden Singularity spike in the world we know so far," Mathias argued, "I thought we'll at least find the reason why here."
"... Maybe there's more than one of them."
"God help us."
Dismissing his sarcastic scoff, Freesia approached him, "Well, whatever it is, doing things by ourselves won't get us closer to our goal. Let's just go back to New York for now, Mathias."
The man stopped in his tracks, bringing relief to his companion. He slowly turned to her with his lips pursed, "Alright… Alright, yeah. Let's go back to the hotel and pack up. I'm getting tired of the sewer smell, anyway."
"I'm sorry, Mathias…"
"It's alright, I've spent almost a decade searching already, what's a few more little setbacks," Mathias said with a smile. Thankfully, the woman caught his attempt at a jest, and exchanged the smile back to him.
"We'll find it."
The woman said in reassurance, the tone of her voice suddenly became cold, darkening the atmosphere surrounding her ethereal form even more.
"We'll find the Singularity that killed your father… and all the other humans it turned."
So I did some formatting biz, make thing look more aesthetic. Tell me if it's an eyesore, or if it's hard to read, and I'll change it.
On another note, THANK YOU AGAIN FOR SUBMITTING! I'm sorry if you had a hard time communicating with me, I know that I made the whole world-building of MHA and it's power system fucked up beyond repair ;-;.
So anyways, I will be opening forms for Singularities soon. And probably permanently! And yes, I will scout for Original Monster Characters for the main villain group, the Apostles, which we shall get to know them more, but I suspect you already know what they are from this chapter alone. I haven't finished designing the form so... keep checking my profile page for updates!
Also, I made a discord server for BtV in case anyone wants to get quicker updates from the author (me): /skPFpJ76
A lot of plans, so I'm gonna keep writing. See ya!
