Late at night,
"Come on! How long is it going to take?" One boy asks, waiting beside his crouched partner. His accomplice is fidgeting with a door knob, using an assortment of tools and trinkets to break the lock.
"You can't rush art, dude. Lockpicking takes time and effort!" The other boy replies.
"Time we don't have much of, so crank up that effort!" Through his frustration, he shoves a few metal objects into the keyhole. A click finally notes their success with the break-in, the head honcho opens the door and begins the sneak in. He pops his head in, telling his accomplice, "Keep a look out. It's going to take me a couple of minutes to pull up our grades and tweak them a little more favorably."
"What do I do if someone comes by?" He asks, and is met with a simple, "Act drunk." A gentle slam is all his friend is left with, making him nervous… And right on time, the shine of a flashlight burns into his eyes.
"Hey! Why are you here late at night?" It's a security guard, obviously not interested in whatever the break-in about to say.
"Oh… I'm… uhhh… just here… to… relax… yah know… just here to… relaaaaaaaxxxxx…" He's trying to slur his words to an exaggerated level, something that the security guard clearly picks up on.
"Sure. Sure. Who's inside the lab?" The boy starts to panic, sweat running down his back as all kind of excuses run through his mind.
"Well, uhh… well, uhh… You see… Well… There's no one—" Before he even finishes his sentence, there's a loud scream coming from the inside the lab. The security guard quickly rush in, opening the door to find the accomplice panicking at the sight of a professor, covered in blood with multiple stab wounds in his chest and torso as he lay there on the floor.
"I-I don't…" Before he could even utter another word, the security guard rushes in and looks at the body. Dead, and it seems that he's been dead for a long while now. Forget these delinquents, he's going to need to write up a much more gruesome report tomorrow.
"The victim is Yanai Shinsui, a 35-year-old biology professor at Shoji University. He was found by a couple of students trying to break into his office, as well as a security guard."
At the crack of dawn, police tape covered the hallway leading up to the now crime scene. Inside, a couple of detectives look at the lab, noting how messy it looked, with all kinds of shattered glass and broken wood. At the center, the outline of the victim remained, the body being hauled off for further analysis.
"Apparently, they found 12 stab wounds to the chest and stomach. Funny, considering he'd be dead after the first 3. This guy really wanted him dead." One of the detective notes, as the other scribbles down on a notepad.
"Huh, you're telling me. Think this has to do with those disappearances a few days back?" The older detective looks down at the stained chair, following the trail of blood that lead to the outline. Looks like the professor had enough energy to crawl for a little bit before dying. But with no weapon to be found and being stabbed that many times in different places? This was a weird one. Usually, murderers this dramatic didn't have a thought in their head to hide the murder weapon.
"No… this is something different." The old man replies.
Just outside, a crowd of students formed, with gossip about who killed the professor and why spreading like wildfire. Two police officers are trying to control the crowd, but then, a van drives on onto the parking lot, with several men in suits and darkened shades filing out and marching towards the scene.
"Halt, this is a crime scene!" One of the officers hold out their hand, but the men still march on forward. Again, the police officer demands, "You're not allowed here. This is police jurisdiction!"
One of the men whips out a badge, and holds it out in front of the officer. "We're authorized by the Public Security Intelligence Agency. This is now under our jurisdiction." The officers look dumbfounded at how high profile this simple murder seems to be, but before any more questions could be asked, the men in suits simply make their way past him and inside the building.
Meanwhile, the detectives are preoccupied with all the evidence before them. So preoccupied that it takes the loud marching of feet. When the two spin around, around 6 men are standing at the entrance of the room.
"H-Hey! What are you doing here?" The younger detective asks but again, the men in black simply bring out their Identification.
"This is no longer your case. This is ours. Please leave the area before we are forced to be more direct." The two detectives look dumbfounded at the sudden news. In any other situation, fists would be flying, but a 6 on 2 with guys as mysterious as this was certainly not ideal. With a mumble, and a grumble, the 2 take their leave.
When they take a step out of the room, the agents get to work. The pull out various hand-held devices, and start scanning, taking pictures, along with storing and recording evidence. Whatever they couldn't deduce here would be sent back to the lab.
And boy, was there a lot they couldn't deduce.
STAR's Main Facility, Intel Division.
For a Team dedicated to analyzing and utilizing information, it was quite an empty and silent place. One corner, someone was looking at a computer with an intensity that couldn't be matched even by the most dedicated of hackers, and on the other, someone was spending all day long organizing physical information and paperwork with the same ease as if they were breathing.
At the head of it all, Mr. Malone. That's what he was called, even by his closest friends. To be honest, no one but the top dogs actually knew who this man was. All they knew was he'd always wear sunglasses, chewing some kind of gum, and if you needed to know something, chances are, he'd have an answer.
Of course, he had to get his information from somewhere, and now, he was looking over the outline from the crime from just a couple of hours ago.
"By the looks of it, Mr. Shinsui must've dated the wrong kind of gal. Hehe." He jests.
"The medical team is currently trying to secure Mr. Shinsui's body from the morgue. Hopefully, the police won't interfere at this point," a voice from beside him adds on, "As far as out field agents could tell, no magical foul play could be traced, and the killer must have escaped using the skylight."
Malone takes a closer look at the photos, images of broken floorboards, chairs, and the aforementioned opened skylight were nicely laid out. "From all my days of gathering dirt, things are never as clear as you want it to be. Plus, no human just breaks several pieces of wood at random then makes a clean exit 10 meters into the air. Maybe it's a vampire… In any case, have Mors on standby in case."
"You mean Agent D?" Malone quickly turns around and looks choked at the mention at that codename. He takes out a stick of gum and plops it into his mouth without a second of delay, chewing loudly.
"Remind me to give her a better codename after this." He sarcastically notes. "By the way, what's up with the new kid on the block… what's his name?"
"Bell." Azrael is standing, or accurately floating, on air with his 2 faded-white wings carrying him. Meanwhile, his son is standing in front of a pitching machine with a sea of tennis balls surrounding him. "I think that's enough."
"No!" Bell shouts, "I gotta figure out how my power works or else I won't be able to go out on missions with sis'!" In spite of his courageous attitude, he's covered in bruises and has got a black eye to boot. For a good 30 minutes, he's pelted himself with tennis balls, convinced that his power has something to do with pain, or some kind of super strength. Myrddin was taking too long to analyze his blood, so he took things into his own hands.
At school, he asked Issei to repeatedly punch him. He said no several times, but after repeatedly begging and pleading to the point where tears were coming out, Issei relented. After a couple of good boosts, the Boosted Gear wielder socked Bell in the face the first time. No reaction. Neither did the next 10 tries yield results before his friend refused to keep hitting him.
Then there was Koneko. She said no the first time, then the second ask, Bell got gut-checked straight into a wall. Still nothing. Even through a barrage of punches did Bell only find himself aching in pain. Like Issei before her, she lost interest and just stopped hitting him, saying, "If you want to hurt yourself so bad, throw yourself off a building."
Soon after considering, then ruling out that idea, he approached Akeno to see if she could help. Bell could swear that she wasn't doing this to help him activate his abilities since she spent a lot more time electrocuting him, and she did it the moment he even asked. In fact, it took Rias and Kiba popping in to get her to stop, all to her (and Bell's) disappointment. Bell then asked Kiba to stab him, to which Rias sat him down and asked, "Are you doing ok?".
An explanation and dismissal from school later, here Bell is, still trying see what makes him tick. Still unsuccessful and with his father's supervision, it seemed like he was going to get anywhere this time.
"One more volley! I can't end on an loss!" Bell rushes over to turn on the machine again, but the flick of the switch didn't bring the engine to life. No, the device had been killed by Azrael, finally on the ground and holding the plug to the pitching machine. "Aw man," the boy proclaimed.
"Bell, have you thought for a moment and thought out, what you can do, and not kept yourself busy with how you can do it?" The dark-haired Angel asked.
"Noooooo." That honest answer didn't seem to leave its mark with Bell, Azrael just simply looking down at him like a dog that tore through his homework.
"Wow, you are too much like your sister. Did she ever teach you how to control your Magic? Like, how she did and stuff?"
"Nope." Another look of frustration aside, Azrael decides that NOW would be a good time to give his son some basic pointers in using magic.
"Sit down. Papa's going to need to give you a lesson on how to magic." The red-haired boy follows his dad's instructions, sitting cris-crossed and jittering in place as he awaited his instructions. "Magic is like, walking, Bell. You don't know how to do it because you haven't realized what it is. Babies learn to walk when they imitate what they see. You haven't seen Mors use Magic much, and therefore you don't have a good grasp at how it functions. Here."
Azrael holds out his hand, and particles of energy cluster into palm before forming into a glowing white sphere of energy. "See what I do here. Don't worry about the mechanics just yet, try and just focus on replicating what I'm doing on a visual level."
And so, Bell holds out his hand and starts to focus on making a ball of energy of his own. With a little strain, nothing happens. He starts to try harder, focusing on the idea of making 'a ball of energy'. Some veins pop out of his head but to no avail.
"Bell, don't try so hard." Azrael comments on his technique, but Bell ignores it, still focusing on making that Ball of energy. He keeps pouring more and more effort into his work, but nothing could seemingly amount from it. Every time he seems to have caught onto something, it was just an off feeling.
"Bell…" Azrael taps his shoulder, but again, his son tries harder, gripping his hand like that is a missing component in order to making this work. Another hand reaches out and grabs his, shaking him to stop. "You're doing it wrong."
"What am I doing wrong?" Bell asks.
"You're trying." Azrael retorts. "If all you do is try, you don't believe you can succeed." His son is clearly lost at the understanding of the metaphor, so Azrael decides to go deeper into putting the understanding right in front of his son.
"When I make this sphere of energy, I'm not trying to make. It's either I make the sphere or I don't make the sphere. If I try to make the sphere, the idea of making is flooded with belief that I can't make it, and therefore, I don't make the sphere. Magic is a lot like that. You need to have the mentality that you can do something presented in front of you, otherwise, you'll end up clouding the process it takes to generate energy and/or magic. That's what trips up a lot of people."
"So… I need to just make a sphere, and then I will!" Bell finally gets it, he thinks. No, he does. He holds out his hand again, and this time, he starts to believe that he can make that sphere. He starts to think up all the dimensions of the sphere, the coloring, everything. He thinks, and he thinks, and he thinks… and nothing emerges. Bell puts his hand back, looking disappointed. "Did I do something wrong?"
"Hmm. Either you're ability is distinct enough that generating and creating magical constructs is not possible, or Chaos Energy operates differently than most kinds of magics. I doubt it considering that's what Mor's was taught, but Demons are a weird bunch, so you never know." Azrael extends his hand out and brings his son up to his feet. "Magic isn't easy for everyone. It can take people years to learn basic spells… though those are rare occasions… Don't beat yourself up." From outside, the intercom blares.
"Can Bell Lin and Mr. Azrael please report to the White Room. Bell Lin and Mr. Azrael!" That's them. Time to get things up and going, maybe with an added ride on the back.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
Mors stands in front of an observatory, which was remodeled to look like an mansion. A rather unkept one too, with all the vines and cracks that covered the building. She thought it was ugly, regardless of it being a literal animal house.
The door opens up and the owner of the house steps out. He's dressed in a fancy green suit, adorned with all kinds of jewelry and animal pins. The shimmer of the jewelry nearly blind her and Mors tries to steer clear metal pieces.
"Are you Professor Mélange?" She asks, and the man nods. "I'm here to talk about your associate, Professor Shinsui. Mind if I come in?"
"Y-Yes. Please, make yourself at home." That was supposed to be homely, but she knew that the second that she touched a couch, all kinds of bugs would fester in her clothes, and she doesn't have the time to clean out her Hunting Fit. She stands in the center of the man's 'living room', whipping out a notebook to record any kind of information he could give her.
"We were just working with a formula to help the metabolism of an animal. It wasn't anything serious. Just making insects eat more and rats burn fat faster." Mr. mélange was in tears at the memory of his colleague flooded back in. "We wanted to move onto bigger animals, seeing how successful small animals were. We were just waiting for a budget increase, but the University kept denying us."
"And? You think you may have pissed off an member of the board, or maybe one of your associates was a Dr. Dolittle to the point where he would sneak in and kill Mr. Shinsui?" Mors prods and Mr. Mélange starts to deny the question.
"No, no! Everyone who knew about the experiment wanted it to succeed! Even most of the College board. I wouldn't think that a single person would want to see us fail, let alone kill us!" He's clearly stressed, and Mors picks up on that note. That wasn't enough. She had no leads, no one that seemingly wanted him or Shinsui dead. But STARS wouldn't just send her in to deal with any regular ole' homicide. There had to be something supernatural. She started to get up and move, looking around the withered home. Some of the plant life from outside was starting to seep into the home. It was a little obscuring, but the discoloration in one of the bunches of weed caught her eye.
"Hey, Professor of the Jungle. Have you told me about everything you know?" The professor gives a nod, and so Mos reaches into the bundle of overgrowth. It felt disgusting and like several thorns were adorning its inside. She tugs her hand back, break up several branches to reveal a piece of paper. "Then please explain this."
Mr. Mélange looks stunned at her revelation, noting that, "I've never seen that book before." He stands up and looks at the Agent, but Mors follows in suit, backing away from the Professor. She started to gleam through the notes, it being clear that this was written by Shinsui. A lot of the formulas and research was not legible to her. "Please, I don't know what that is."
"It belonged to your dear old friend. Tell me, did he ever slide you some bucks under the counter to hide some of his personal stuff?"
"No, I swear I don't know!" Slowly, Mors approaches him.
"There's some really interesting stuff in here. I don't want to fridge you man, but you got to give me something. Why would your buddy hide something from even you?" Mors is just a foot away from the professor.
With sweat beads running down his face, Mr. Mélange begins to crack, trying to remember any stray piece of data. "W-Well… uhhh… The Salad Bar!"
"Are you calling me fat?"
"No! The Salad Bar is a place teacher's and professors hang out after school. One day, when we were hanging out, a guy with a white flower on his suit talked to us about funding our project, but we declined. I didn't make much of it. Here, I'll give you the address." He scribbles down some numbers, and even a code to enter the place. Mors looks through the paper, eyeing the man one last time before nodding and heading out.
The professor lets out one last sigh of relief, but right as he does. "Hey, smile!" There's a flash, and a few seconds later, Mr. Mélange is in his living room, confused why the clock went from 12:30 to 12:40. Must've napped. Must've been a deep one too, since he swore he just heard a van peeling off into the distance. He's got to sleep eating before sleeping.
At the salad bar,
Certainly wasn't a salad bar. Just like any old bar. Rusty and Simple, but homely in a way to accompany the drunkest of men. Might be the daylight lighting changing things. All kinds of teachers and overworked victims of the Japanese schooling system go to drink their woes away and make mistakes away from the eyes of the school board.
Mors didn't really get it. Drinking. Like, dad told her that people do it for the sensation being drunk bestows, but all signs pointed to that level of intoxication just being more stressful than relaxing. But she wasn't here to drink. Ok, that's a lie. She blew a couple of bucks on iced tea.
Still, an Agent had to accompany her since she still wasn't of legal drinking age, at least in Japan. The woman in the suit was asking the bartender some questions regarding the "man with the white rose".
"That guy?" the bartender scoffs, "He's a pretty odd fellow. Comes in here in the afternoon to talk with a bunch of Professors. Doesn't even drink anything but a cold glass of water. Not even with a lime or anything."
"Right. Do you happen to know if he drove a car? Or if he lives around here?" The man starts to think, trying to remember any details about the supposed man. Snapping his fingers a couple of times, he dawns on the thought, "I remember that he came in a small limo a couple of times. Same license plate too. 99 25-21. White Carriage of sorts."
The agent scribbles down all this information, nodding her head to the beat of words. Afterwords, she thanks him for everything he's given her. Trailing from behind, Mors puts down 3 1k Yen bills on the counter.
"Keep the change, my good sir." She comments, sipping on her 3rd ice tea as she ducks back into the van. The agent starts typing the license plate into a small computer, uploading it to the Intel Team so they can hone on where that limo could be. All the while, a particularly noisy sipping sent glances behind her, the culprit failing to hide her crimes.
Lunch Break.
The Father and Son duo are spending some of their free time eating their sandwiches. Tuna and PBJ respectively. Bell was a messy eater, but he could tell his dad was step away from looking like he's about the rip into his meal like a wild animal. He's seen his dad cook many times, not actually eating said food. Why was that?
That thought was quickly abandoned as the boy starts to think. Does he actually have powers? Maybe the Horseman of War just lacked anything big but super strength. That's fine! Totally. Just being strong wasn't the worst thing… he could still be of help! Maybe some more training and trying to get some bulk in his step would be beneficial.
Still would be lacking compared to Mors, Issei, Kiba, hell, even Koneko could do more than him and she just hits hard. That could just be how the cookie crumbles. Some people are just not cut out for the intense stuff! Yeah…
Azrael looks up at Bell and his slow, careful bites. "Not as messy as usual, eh?"
Bell gives faint chuckle, not even noticing what he's doing. He picks up the pace to enjoy the creamy goodness of the jelly-butter combination. In the second of him finishing, he gets back up and starts to walk away. Immediately, his dad calls out, "Where are you going?"
"Back to the white room." Bell states, "Mr. Myrddin still has test to run, right?" Bell gives a smile, disappearing in a flash. His father stops himself short from pursuit, sitting down to finish his sandwich. Though, each bite is much uneasier than usual, and even after finishing each chew, genuine minutes would pass before he took another.
Even after filling his stomach with food, worry left an empty hole that could not as easily be filled.
"Bell… please…"
Outside a small house,
Mors takes note of the white limo outside, matching license plate and carriage description. Took a good while to track this down. She knocks at the door, and guessing that no one's going to bother to answer, she busts the door down. Her gun is taken out of its holster and raised up as she scans the inside of each room. It looked like the typical house, albeit just small, until she comes across the kitchen.
All kinds of tubes, beakers, and chemicals were spread about. Looks like they forgot to clean up before they left. She slowly wades through all kinds of glass and containers, all of them empty. That led to her shattering several of them with even her most gentle step, before she said, screw it and just walked normally.
A filtering system was set up, most of its contents empty except for the finished product: a blue vial, and right beside that a book she picks up, its pages filled with similar formulas that Mors saw in the paper from the Professor's house. Right as she starts to read.
THUD.
A large sound comes from the roof, catching her attention. Quickly pointing her gun into the air, taking a few seconds to steady and letting off several rounds, going "BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!" until she's out of bullets. Silence.
Mors spins her gun around for a bit, proudly holstering it as she proclaims, "Bullseye." Immediately afterwards, a giant monster hand breaks through the roof and grabs her head. She's flung out of the roof and into the air, taking a few moments to tumble in the air right as the monster swoops in and starts tussling with her in the air.
The shadowy, bat-like mass starts to bite at her chest, her arm barely managing to protect her. She fires off several rounds into the monster's chest, to which they have no effect. Fangs sink into the her arm, forcing her to let go of her gun.
The monster threw her high into the air, and right as gravity pulls her back down, the monster descends like a torpedo. With a moment of recovery, Mors summon forth a large, spectral skeleton hand, decking the bat monster in the face. It goes crashes into the ground, whereas Mors crashes right back into the house.
"Alright, let's get this started!" Mors hypes herself to go after the bat monster, but is stopped seconds later when sonic wave crashes into the house, causing the entire thing to collapse on top of her. In the distance, the bat monster violently coughs before taking flight away from the destruction.
The agent runs over to the rubble, looking for any trace of Mors, right as the Horseman pops her head out of the debris, covered in dust, hair frizzled and looking worse. "Seems like all that evidence was destroyed…" The agent unfortunately remarks.
"Yeah… except for this." Mors whips out the notebook she pocketed from earlier. Quickly, she gleams through the book, trying to find who exactly could be at fault. Nothing but math she doesn't get. "Only thing I understand, a name: Felix Trenton. Conservationist. Call up some of the guys… uhhh.."
"Lisa." The agent replies. "You didn't know my name?"
"Hey, in my defense, I'm not good with names."
"Mr. Trenton, we have you here, listed as a provider of 'resources'. Who are you handing these resources to?"
"I'm a provider of many exotic things, sir. You have to be more specific." The blonde conservationist jokes.
The interrogator stands up, pulling out the receipts for various purchases of all kinds of animals, as well as the piece of paper with the listed formulas. "This! You were working with someone to experiment on these poor animals. Who is it? We already have you stuck in here, might as well take who you're working with down with you."
The man simply looks up at the interrogator, giving a douchey smile. That nearly earned him a punch to the face, but the interrogator pulls back and leaves the room. Outside, Mors, Mr. Malone and few members of the Intel Team wait for the summary.
"Well, he isn't budging. Very soon, we're going to have to wipe his mind and hand him over to the authorities. But we still haven't gotten a name or so much as a place from him."
"We're doing our best to track all his online messages. But whoever he was talking with is good at scrubbing their current whereabouts." Mr. Malone comments. "At the very least, we have an idea of what killed Mr. Shinsui. That bat-thing Agent M fought. The lab found out his wounds contained traces of Bat DNA, and there's a motive. We'll keep you updated on what else we can find."
With that, the group disperses. Mors strolls off to find her family, quickly coming across and bruised and dust covered Bell. She voices her worry, "Yo, Bell. You alright?"
"Yeah. I'm fine." He looks a bit dreary, and Mors asks if he's sure, but he responds in a much louder voice, "I'm good. You don't need to worry." Right as he walks off. Then she's left alone, concerned and tired, slight pain kicking occasionally from her injuries. But even that didn't blind her worry.
"Oh no."
The Bat Monster flies down through an open hole, crawling to its master. A man draped in ragged clothing turns around, petting the creature and throws it a sliver of fresh meat to snack on.
"The evidence is disposed of, and those vermin are off my trail. My plans can come to fruition at long last. For too long, mankind has remained the dominant species of this planet, and all their sickening wastefulness and disregard for everything, even themselves!"
He moves to a fridge, filled with dozens of those blue vials from before. Filling a syringe with the serum, he stalks over to a cages with an assortment of animals, ranging from lions, tigers, and bears. The needle slides into the skin of one of the monsters, causing them slight pain. Not as bad as the oncoming agony they would feel with their metamorphosis. Bones crack, muscles expand, and bodies are altered to the point where the animals are barely recognizable. To most people, this is a horrible sight, to this maniac, it was a sign of a resounding success.
"But now, with this mutagenic formula, I'll take these apex predators and place them on the top of the totem, me at the helm! This world shall be mine!"
