I've always lived within the Luna Sphere, right at the base where Luna's SEA branch remains. I love the ocean; luckily, where I lived, I had a perfect view. My father would also let me swim often because of the augmentations he provided me. I never knew why he gave me this body. I have gills on my ribs, and the webbing between my fingers is thicker and more prominent compared to the average person. Other than that, I look like your average girl, a bit shorter than the rest, but normal regardless.
I had learned to hate my father. I have a variety of reasons, but mostly it came from stories Auntie would tell me through the phone, and when I got older, I realized how restrictive this palace he had me in had become. I share his red hair and sharp eyes, and I never got to know my mother. I think I know why, though, especially now. One of the strongest men in the world, even having the title of the "Sea Serpent", capable on his own of dismantling an entire Sphere with his strength.
Yet, a horrible criminal he is. He had assaulted Auntie, and seemingly, there were more women he had taken advantage of. I believed it, not because I didn't have reason to distrust him, but because he is, as a person. Arrogant, controlling, and... dead. Dead in the eyes, with no life behind them, nearly emotionless in every situation he had been in.
Apparently, I had a Twin Sister as well who went through similar augments as I, who had run away before me, so clearly, they had a reason to do so.
At the age of eighteen, I received an Instrument of his, the Anchorbow, a powerful weapon given to me for self-defense. He had taught me how to fight, but something like this was unexpected. Maybe he could sense what was going to happen next, and how I was planning for this moment since the very beginning. I just needed time, time to familiarize myself with this Instrument of destruction.
Apparently, he had gotten this weapon from a TULPA called the Leviathan. How he could've retrieved this from such a creature, however, even with his great strength, there are limits to one's capabilities. Mercury, at least their SHIVERS branch should be the only organizational force capable of creating Instruments like these, aside from some exceptions, yet here it is, and I can feel the power it holds each day I wield them.
The Anchorbow comprises a massive crossbow in the shape of an anchor, which it is in a way, but sports a pressurized valve at its base, a handle at the very end of the anchor itself connected on a chain to a smaller anchor, about the size of a man's hand, with a duo pressurized chamber mechanism. Heavy and powerful, the perfect pair of weapons for my escape.
At nineteen, I left the palace in search of my sister.
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I was already particularly adept at utilizing my Manifest, especially paired with the Instrument my Father gave me. It made the training required to become a member of Grief easier for me than most. Not a lot of those without Manifests could participate in their trials anyhow until they had gone through rigorous training, and for those with Manifests, it's almost as if you were given special privileges.
Not to say the training wasn't difficult, mind you. It practically consisted of two years working as a Gardner handling TULPAs after all, but after that, you were sent straight into one of the Zodiacs as a Rank I soldier.
My Manifest lets me change the properties of things, so, for example, I'm able to temporarily make an object similar to that of a liquid, or form a thin line of liquid across the floor, et cetera. The ability to change-- incredibly versatile but limited in power-- but in combination with something as deadly as your own personal instrument, that weakness doesn't matter too much. Mind you, TULPA Instruments, at least, very powerful ones, are bound to you, so the Anchorbow is stuck with me for life since it came from a MEGA TULPA entity, plus, if I didn't end up joining Grief anyways, they would've pried it from my cold, dead hands rather than let me keep it.
I, who is more keen on Kismet Energies, noticed a few things during my days as a Gardner, however. The energies emitted from even the lowest ranks, for example, a MIM or NIC class entity, still hold an amount of Kismet Energy capable of leveling a building, but due to the nature of some of these entities, they remain stable. I feel I have underestimated TULPAs up until this point.
Unfortunate that my job is essentially to constantly observe or contain such entities in Grief outside of Wonderland, the base of operations for SHIVERS.
Not so unfortunate is that everything went exactly as I planned, luckily. Alex Lee, she became the Assistant Captain of the Goat Zodiac team. The team is frowned upon, but I couldn't care less about what others think. I just want answers and to use this opportunity to get stronger. I, at the very least, would like to see my father put away for good or dead before I even begin thinking about my future.
"I believe the Captain's name is Norayr?" I whispered to myself, double-checking my pager, which had a list of those in the Goat Zodiac, taking a step into a wide and empty gymnasium, the outside sunlight beaming down at the group before me.
I believe I clocked the man instantly-- clearly older than the rest of us with long stringy black hair and dead-looking eyes, a long scar running along the left side of his face that met an amber eye with a horizontal pupil. He was also the tallest in the room by far, easily reaching about 195cm in height, only rivaled by a girl sitting on the bleachers nesting a sketchpad in their lap. That girl had ginger hair similar to my own and emerald green eyes. Honestly, aside from my freckles and me not having emerald eyes (Or the fact that they aren't wearing glasses), I'd be convinced that they were my sister instead of Alex.
I'd like to mention, I had my weaponry hidden from the start, wrapped in a thick cloth which matched my red hair, keeping only the hand anchorbow visible on my waist. I wouldn't want people asking questions this early.
The Captain noticed me after a moment passed, simply gesturing for me to cross over to him, which I did. As I approached, I took it upon myself to scan the man further, and he didn't appear to have a badge establishing his Rank visible on his person.
To provide context, Gardners, members of Grief and Grimm included, all have Ranks amongst their peers within SHIVERS. It has seven ranks, all of us here, as far as I know, being Rank I, I believe, identified by several badges on either the cuffs of our uniforms or collars. He had none visible.
"Do you find me bizarre?" The man coldly spoke, his voice seeming almost soulless compared to the energetic youthfulness of my peers. "You're gawking."
"I wouldn't say gawking is the right word, Captain."
"Nora."
"What?"
"Forgo the polite honorifics, Nora is fine."
Compared to us, he wore a long coat over a white dress shirt and black slacks. Is it because he's a Captain? "Ye-- Okay... Nora."
His hand was in his coat pocket, clicking something; it was incessant. "I've heard about you from one of the Gardners."
"You have?"
Nora appeared to have already moved on from the topic as he began to cross over to the other end of the gymnasium, and taking his place in the spot he was standing previously was a tall woman with short black hair and sunken dark eyes-- pale as a ghost. "Where is he going?" She whispered under her breath.
I took a breath, putting a hand out to greet them, "Ariel Marcet, pleasure to meet you."
The girl turned to look at me, brows pinched before relaxing her expression and shaking my hand in return. "Cut the polite talk, okay? Chris."
"I don't know you well enough yet to do so." I let go of her hand. "How many do we have?"
"A surprising amount." She followed my gaze to look at the other members of our group. "Including the Captain and our Assistant Captain, it's eleven of us. I think they expect some of us to die or something-- too many compared to the other groups." She yawned, "Welp, if that's the case, I guess I'll make my peace with some smokes." Chris commented in a cavalier way before leaving the room momentarily.
I could tell even from what she wore that she seemed unusually thin. She had a black hoodie instead of a basic suit jacket like some of us here. I wasn't exactly conventional either. I was about 149cm, and instead of slacks, I had a long airy skirt and a black cap atop my head. I don't believe that the weirdly tall emerald-eyed girl is even wearing a uniform at all, just black and white to fit, and everyone else... well, they--
I forgot about one that stood out the most. They seemed to be only a couple of dozen centimeters taller than me and wore a knight's visor and armored gauntlets over their suit. You see, armoring yourself by wearing something under your suit, or maybe a few items over your suit, isn't too unusual, especially if you have any TULPA Gear on you, but full metal armor from the medieval ages takes the cake, really.
The only physical trait that I could discern from the knight was that they appeared to have long platinum blond hair that rolled past her shoulders. Unusual is an understatement.
After a moment of pause, the Captain, along with the awaited Alex, entered the room. She definitely looked similar to me, just taller and with frizzier hair. Fraternal twins... now... how do I broach the conversation with her? I thought to myself before both of them stood in front of the group as a whole, Chris finally re-entering the gymnasium, right on time.
"A team has been set," Alex spoke, hands behind her back as she projected her voice so we all could hear her, even snapping the little artist amongst our midst out of their trance.
"A team?" A young man, caramel-colored skin with moderately long black hair, wielding what looked to be an axe and hammer paired together, and similarly bound weapons to my own strapped to his back. They call themselves Tel, "What's this about teams? I thought we already were supposed to be the team, right?"
"This is your first day of service. We'll be separating ourselves into two teams to do two different jobs."
"Already? Shouldn't we, like... get to know each other first? Maybe become familiarized in each other's fighting styles? Get a lay of the land on what our Zodiac even does?"
"The teams will be separated between Nora's group and my own." She stopped and looked at me in particular for a moment before continuing. "I will be taking, Ms. Gale--" A young woman with short black hair wearing a newsboy cap and black frilly clothes steps off from the bleachers, walking over to Alex, followed by a massive grey hound.
"Mr. Ikarios," The young man complaining before stepped up with a sigh, keeping a hand grasping tightly at the weapons on his waist.
"Ms. Anderson," Chris, the woman from before, stepped up as well, standing beside Tel with the same devil-may-care attitude she had when I spoke to her.
"Ms. Marcet," And then I followed, keeping myself a decent distance away from Alex.
"Ms. Stromer," The antsy tall girl with emerald-eyes slowly gathered with the rest of us as Nora proceeded to take anyone who wasn't called by Alex with him and out of the gymnasium almost immediately.
"What are they leaving to do?" I questioned, looking at my belated sister.
Alex met my gaze for a moment, spinning on the balls of her feet and out of the gymnasium, prompting us to follow. "We are to do a specific job-- investigative in nature, whilst Nora's group will be participating in regular patrols around the Spheres.
Tel noticed Alex's wording and spoke up. "So we do go through other spheres?"
"Of course we do."
"N-No, not what I meant. I'm more questioning why we do so for something so menial like a patrol?"
"It's to scan for anyone who is a minute away from losing their minds..." Alex sighed. "Those with Manifests can turn into TULPAs at any time, y'know? Rarely is it ever an actual threat, but it's for something like that. Plus, it's to police for those with Manifests as well. There's only so much the Stars can watch over themselves, after all."
"I see..."
"For us, on that matter," She stopped in front of a van. "We're going to the Tierra Sphere."
Without hesitation, Chris opened the door to the van before stepping inside, sitting down at the farthest end of the vehicle. With that, everyone else followed, Alex jumping into the driver's seat.
I sat as close as I could to the driver's seat myself, hoping that we could speak on the road, which I'd immediately grow to regret as Valorie decided to squeeze herself into the seat next to me, not only being significant in height, but in width as well, shoved into Alex's backrest followed by a succinct apology from the girl. The massive wolfhound didn't exactly help, however.
That's not fat, that's a sizeable bit of muscle. I noticed after a moment sitting beside the larger woman, unable to contain how impressed I was for a girl who seemed as introverted as herself to carry such a capable build amongst the lot of us.
I sighed, lightly tilting my head in Alex's direction. "Is there any reason you haven't specified what the mission is about?"
She glanced over her shoulder before taking a breath and projecting her voice for the whole van to hear. "We're heading to Tierra to do two things-- do you hear me, everyone!?"
Tel gave a thumbs up, while the rest of us unanimously affirmed with a "Yeah," in response.
"First, in Tierra, there was supposedly a man who had gone missing years back. Nobody thought anything of it until now, especially since back then, the Inferno was happening, Mercury didn't clock that the missing man had exploded outwardly with an immense amount of Kismet Energy. We're to look at it now that the Inferno has cooled down, and there is no one in the way to interrupt our pursuits to learn and protect."
"We didn't have anyone from Grief doing... y'know, their job? They were out battling it in the war?" Tel questioned.
"Mind you, this was before SHIVERS even existed as well."
"Oh? I thought..."
"Wonderland existed, but at the time, SHIVERS was not a separate branch by that point until a couple of years into the Inferno, and even then, it was only technically an idea that she and her husband had at the time."
"Okay, so this potential TULPA case happened under your noses, we're gonna deal with that?"
"Yes, and we're to retrieve a missing member of our team."
"Wait, what?"
"In Tierra, there's a church to what they believe is the God of Cultivation called Saint Mary's. We're going there to retrieve our runaway grunt. Luckily, it isn't too far from our missing persons case."
"First mission, and it's something that'll easily last us a week from what I can tell." Tel sighed.
Chris chewed on the butt of a cigarette. "What's the danger level?"
"MIM, which is why we're doing it."
Chris smirked. "Good to know~! I get to be lazy!" She chuckled, leaning back into her seat before throwing her legs out as obnoxiously wide as possible, causing me to be squeezed more into my section of the van.
Suddenly, the detective girl spoke up. "I believe introductions are in order. I am Dorothy Gale," she gestured to the hound lying flat on their belly in the middle of the van, "This is Toto."
"Chris Anderson." She responded, playing with their lighter, flicking on the flame of it before snapping the lid on, extinguishing it as quickly as it formed.
"Uh..." The young man with us, and the only man with us, groaned. "Tel Ikarios."
"Ariel Marcet."
"That sounds familiar..." Tel mumbled before the large girl beside me put up a single, sheepish hand as if asking to be called on amidst a class full of students.
"Valorie Stromer..." She looked to Alex in the driver's seat. "W-What's the town's name?"
"Sunflower Village."
"Oh... I-I see..."
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"Victor Flynn? He's dead."
"I'm sorry, what?"
At the village, Victor's brother, Theo, immediately responded to Alex's question in a crass manner, slumped into their seat, flipping through a newspaper. "You're a decade too late. Simple as. One of the local boys admitted that they accidentally blew my brother's brains out after finding one of those pistols from the war. There is your answer."
"So he's dead..." Alex paused, shaking her head. "Sir, we found Kismet Ene--"
"It doesn't change the fact that he isn't missing, and rather he's dead." Theo clicked his tongue. "I can show you where he died, though."
Golden fields of wheat greeted us, slowly pushed by passing winds, and all of us were collected here, standing right where a man died, a chair and easel being all that remained of this man's life within this town aside from paintings his brother kept.
Alex's arms were crossed, brow knitted, and chin cupped. "There were signs that we had detected of a TULPA being here, or rather, a TULPA has been formed in this spot, but..."
Dorothy chimed in, "You figured this wouldn't be as simple, no?"
"Of course not."
"I can help in this case."
"Yes... I remember, this is what you're specialized in, yes?"
Tel cocked a brow, putting a hand up. "What is she specialized in?"
Dorothy spoke up for Alex, "Investigative work." She followed her comment up by pointing to the chair and easel, taking a step back, "Toto." The wolfhound stepped up, circling the objects of interest before digging its nose into the dirt.
"Valorie," I saw her in my periphery, looking almost as if she was retreating into her own mind, clutching her arm and distancing herself from the site of the incident. "Are you okay?"
She stopped herself, blinking in response to my ask. "S-Sorry, I... n-no, I'm alright." Valorie closed back in with the group.
"You haven't looked very comfortable with this whole thing ever since Alex mentioned where we were going in the van a few hours ago."
"It's just..." She sighed, looking out to the golden field before her. "I dunno... I can't p-put it into words... c-can I come back with an answer later?"
What the hell is she talking about? "Sure... okay. Whatever you're comfortable with."
Dorothy held a hand up to catch our attention. "We should try finding the ones who seemingly killed Victor-- Toto's probably memorized the scents here by now."
Returning to Theo, Alex broached the question, "Is there any way you could direct us to the boys in question who caused Victor Flynn's death?"
Theo took a moment, standing up from their seat before taking out a metal flask from their back pocket. They uncapped it, pressing the lid to their lips before capping the flask, eliciting a sigh. "You know, you aren't gonna get anything."
"We aren't planning to arrest them."
"No, I mean that there aren't any leads that you can take, but..." They paused, "Well... there's me, then there are my brother's paintings, and then the place where he died. That's it."
"There wasn't a body found, though, was there?" Dorothy chimed in, scratching her chin.
Theo searched for answers within Dorothy's expression before responding, "How'd you know that?"
"Then that means this whole thing isn't a dud, is it?"