It was almost as if all of the air had been sucked out of the room. Destiny sat there staring at her old friend, words tried to come to her but none of them seemed to stick. She was too shocked by what her friend had just said. “I thought that you had questions and wanted answers?” Jessica questioned, with that same annoying smirk plastered across her face. “Do I need to say it again or?”
“You are still a fucking monster.” Destiny in a low tone.
“Ebony darling?” Her friend looked up at the girl standing beside her. “Be a dear, and step outside for a moment. I don’t want my old friend’s foul language to have a negative effect on your innocent mind.” That girl didn’t need to be told twice as she quickly scurried out of the room.
Destiny waited until that girl had left the room before she went on. “How can you still be such a monster, Jessica?”
“I am not a monster, Destiny. We just have different ideas on-” Destiny slammed her hands on the table causing the bottle on the table to topple over onto its side. As it threatened to roll off the table, Jessica reached out and calmly set two fingers on the bottle. “Can you not break something so expensive, I got this freshly made for you, we were supposed to drink this together but that never happened.”
“How can you be so dense that you don’t see the wrongs in your actions?” Destiny desperately wanted to jump across this table, and strangle this woman to death but something was holding her back. Destiny took one more deep breath before relaxing her hands on the hard wood of the table. Her nails left a few deep marks and she forced herself to stare at her old friend. “You are still the same cold, manipulative bitch, and if it wasn’t for that poor child laying in bed. I would finish what we started seven years ago.”
“Destiny, if you're still mad about Ruth, then maybe-” Her friend didn’t finish that sentence as a loud smacking noise filled the air. Destiny’s hand stung but probably not as badly as Jessica’s face. A violent red mark appeared on the woman’s cheek threatening to match the color of her hair. She heard chairs get pushed back as the only other family in this hospital began to quickly leave.
Destiny brought her hand back down to rest on the table. The chilly surface felt good on her burning hand. Destiny took a deep breath before in a low deep rumble of a voice she said. “Say her name again, and I will kill you.”
Jessica's calm expression shifted to one of pure rage and hatred. Destiny silently prepared herself for the fight that was about to come. After all that is how their last fight started, over one simple slap. However, a return blow never came, Jessica folded her hands together in front of her. “I will not say her name again.”
“Now talk, who is this girl to you?”
“Her name is Lola Summers,” Jessica reached down and set a black briefcase on the table. She undid the clips before reaching in and sliding a file over to Destiny. “The organization I currently work for, found her deep in the heart of The Red Wood Forests. She showed the slight shimmer that all of us jepei users give off but she was different. Her jepei aura was spilling into different colors with each breath she took. From golden brown, to ocean blue, to vibrant pink and sickening gray. We took her in and began to learn just what she was. We are not sure what animal spirit she actually has, but we can confirm at least it is a Mystical Creature of some kind.”
Most animal spirits were placed into three different categories. Living creatures, ancient or extinct creatures, animal spirits that have died out ranging from the beasts that once walked the earth millions of years to even recent additions such as the Tasmanian tiger and dodo bird. Lastly, and most rare of all animal spirits one could have mystical creatures. For those on the mainland, the idea of the thunderbird, fairies, centaurs, dragons and krakens are just myths, but to jepei users they are powerful spirit animals that granted their owner powers that no other jepei user could have. Even some of the greek gods of old, in reality were just powerful jepei users all with mystical creatures as their animal spirits.
Destiny began to thumb though this thick file. It was filled with papers on the small child upstairs, and one thing immediately came to her. “Project seven in one?” Destiny question, as she looked up at Jessica, the burning red welt on her face was already starting to heel over.
“We call her that because she seems to have seven different personalities trapped inside of that small head of hers. Each seems to be able to use whatever gifts she has been giving in very different ways. We have done our best to-.” Jessica stopped for a moment, almost as if she was deciding what words to use next. “To tame her other personalities, as well as keep her power in check.”
“You have been taming her by whipping the poor girl senseless?” Destiny questioned her rage starting to boil over once more.
Her old friend lifted her hands up in a calming way. “Relax, Destiny, I maybe a lot of things, most of them horrible according to you, but I can assure you that we did not cause those specific marks. We have no idea who did it to her, and whenever someone tries to talk to her about that, well that usually ends up with either Amber or Ember coming out.”
“Who?”
“Flip to page 12, and page 15.” Destiny hated doing anything this woman told her too, but right now she needed to have answers. On this first page, she was greeted with an image of the same girl that had come to her doorstep. Only she was sitting on the ground, her long cover of golden brown hair spilling over her shoulders and pooling onto the ground. She had a fierce set of eyes of a matching color, and her slightly open mouth displayed a few sharp teeth. “Amber seems to be her strength and greatest protector, I have watched this little one carve through trained fighters with ease. She refused any kind of combat training and often uses her mastery over amplification to just keep attacking. She has an odd healing factor as well but as we both know using amplification to heal wounds is both a blessing and a curse. Amber apparently gets her name because she is as strong as… well Amber.”
“As for Ember, she is much like the sister to Amber. Only while Amber is strength, Ember is her rage, her fury, her hatred, mostly anger.” On page 15, Destiny was met with a girl with short fiery red hair, she was leaning back against a small mattress on the floor. Her eyes were bright orange and she had a slight grin on her face. “This is where things start to not make sense with this little brat. Ember seems to get her name from the fiery coat that takes over her jepei aura when she comes out. Her flames can overwhelm someone even with their protection up.” While amplification could infuse jepei into the muscles and limbs to make them stronger, protection aura was made to keep the body protected from blows and strikes, one could turn their jepei into a hard shell that could take strikes. It could deflect bullets, block blades, cushion blows from trucks or other accidents. As a former master in combat, Destiny would always tell her former students that protection was the strongest of the three basic techniques. “This can and will save your life, if used properly.”
Destiny read over this file a bit more, finding herself even more intrigued in this brief look over. “Can I keep this file?” Destiny closed the file and set her eyes back onto Jessica, who was sipping on her glass of wine. Another bottle had been placed on the table, as she began to pour out more of the smooth red liquid.
“I have more files, so I suppose you can keep that one.” Jessica finished pouring her drink before looking up at Destiny with a smile. “Though tell me, why are you gonna keep that file?”
“I’ll answer that once you answer this question.” Destiny narrowed her eyes just slightly before asking. “What did you mean that you need my help in protecting your prize?”
“I am so glad you asked.” Jessica straightened up a bit, seemingly growing more confident now. “What I mean by that is as you have seen Amber had taken quite a bit of damage when she arrived on your doorstep.”
“That she did.”
“Why do you think that is the case?” Destiny simply shrugged her shoulders. “Well to be honest, she has been a lot of trouble and my superiors decided that she might not be worth the hassle anymore. So we were going to…”
“You were gonna kill her?” Destiny finished in disbelief. ‘
“Believe me I was just as surprised when I got the order but there was nothing I could do.” Jessica began to grin. “Then as we walked in to do the deed, Amber was waiting for us and that girl fought tooth and nail to escape our clutches. I have never seen anything like it before, of course she took a lot of damage in the process, but she managed to escape. I was ordered to give chase, and it seemed God was smiling down at me because of all the houses in this city. She came to your doorstep, and then I had an idea, an idea that can help both of us.”
Jessica leaned forward a bit and in an excited whisper asked. “Can you raise this girl for me?”
“Excuse me?” Destiny question.
Jessica looked as excited as she always did when she came up with her usual schemes. “I cannot afford for this girl to be killed, and I think we both know that I would be a terrible mother. So how about instead, I place her in the care of someone who knows what they are doing. You can give her an actual life, it would be a wonderful case study, wouldn’t it? See how such a special girl reacts to a normal life, see how her seven personalities react to a stable life without fear or worry. See how they change, how they grow, how much stronger they could get. You could give everything that we never could or cared to give her.”
Destiny's mouth went dry as she listened to her ramble on and on, starting to speak so fast that some might be thrown off, but she was used to this. This was still the same Jessica that she had grown up with, but what once used to bring her joy now made her remember how much she now hated this girl. Cause throughout all this ramble, all of her fast paced nonsense, one thing was clear. She wanted to use that poor child upstairs as a weapon of some kind, a weapon to bring her glory, a weapon to bring her honor, and a weapon to bring her praise, and she wanted her help to do that. “And of course,” Jessica said with a slight wave of her hand. “I will make sure you are properly paid for your service, do you want this monthly or weekly pay perhaps? Whatever you choose, whatever you want, as long as you raise my prize everything will be just fine.”
She looked at Destiny with an almost expectant look. “Jessica… what happens if I decline your offer?”
“Then I take the girl back with me, and find someone else to do this task. She is mine, she belongs to me, she is my property.” It was at that, that the table went sliding across the room. All of the glasses and bottles crashed to the floor, staining the marble floor with thick red liquid. Destiny wasted little time as she wrapped a hand around her throat and stood up. “W-Wait, Dede give me a-” Jessica's voice faded as her face began to take on a deep red color.
Destiny rose to her feet lifting Jessica off the ground and she slammed her into the wall behind her. The veins in her arm started to glow gold as her amplification increased her grip strength. Jessica’s eyes went wide as she dug her sharp nails into Destiny’s arms, a tiny bit of blood ran down forearm as she took scratches, yet she didn’t feel the pain. She could care less about the pain right now, rage was a very good pain killer, and she was filled with it. As she looked at her friend it finally occurred to her that Jessica was exhausted. Her eyes were sunken and baggy, as sweat began to form on her brow, Destiny could see the first signs of older age.
Destiny slowly leaned in before saying in a low tone. “Listen to me very carefully, if you thought for even a moment that I would take even a tiny bit of blood money from you, then you have gotten dumber as you have gotten older. So let me make something very, and I mean very clear to you. You are to never show your face to me or that little girl again, she is under my protection as one of the masters of Tarun’s Island. She is going nowhere with you, she does not belong to you, am I understood.”
Jessica gave a weak nod of her head and Destiny let go of her, sending her sprawling down on the ground in a heap. “Suddenly, you want to use that little title of yours.” Jessica spat out once she could breathe again. “If I wasn’t exhausted, you would have never touched me.” Jessica slowly stood up to feet leaning back against the wall, looking much weaker than Destiny had even seen her look before in her life. Jessica lifted her hand up and out of the corner of her eye, Destiny could see that young woman from before was standing in the now empty cafeteria. In her hands were a pair of dark green daggers that curved near the tips. Jepei users gain access to a lot of different abilities, one of the best was being able to forge a weapon made of your own jepei aura. Whatever you wanted within reason, a jepei user could forge out of their jepei, but it took a large chuck of aura whenever they brought them out.
Destiny turned her attention back on Jessica. “When did you need to start having a bodyguard?”
“That is none of your concern, just know that if you try that again, Ebony will gladly cut your fat ass down to size.” It seemed that without that family in the cafeteria with them, her friend was no longer putting up pleasantries. Jessica began to violent cough for a moment, her legs wobbling as if she was going to collaspe. For a moment, Destiny wanted to reach out to steady her friend, to be the shoulder she needed to stand up. However, she couldn’t quite bring herself to do so. Instead, she stepped back as her assassitant came rushing forward to lay a hand on her. “Get off me!” She snapped pushing the young woman away.
Memeories of her friend doing that same stunt to her filled her mind. “Still so stubborn to anykind of help, Jessie.”
“Shut your mouth!” Jessica said, her eyes filled with vemon. “I shouldn’t have brought her to you. I should have just sent Ebony here to pick her up.”
“But you didn’t,” Destiny took a few steps closer and the light-skinned girl instinctually placed an arm out in front of Jessica. “Child, please don’t do anything foolish. I doubt you can even go five minutes with me.”
The girl’s soft brown eyes remained locked onto her in a narrow glare. “How about I prove you wrong, Master Myers.” Her eyebrow raised in a sort of challenging way, the grip on her daggers tightening.
“Put those away, Ebony.” Jessica ordered. “We have already caused too much of a scene thanks to this brute.” She shot another weak glare at Destiny before straightening up. “Let me ask you a question?” Almost like pulling a veil down, Jessica's face became her usually calm expression. “Are you serious about this Destiny? Are you really gonna take this little one from me just so I can’t have her.”
“I am taking her from you because I do not trust you, and you just want a weapon.” Destiny stepped closer so she once again stood face to face with Jessica. “I told you once, and I will say it again, you will never create another weapon, not as long as I am still standing.”
Jessica’s mouth slowly curled up into a tight smile. “Than perhaps when I truly want a weapon, I will sweep your legs out from under you.” Jessica patted Destiny on her arm before walking past her. “Let’s go, Ebony. We have business to do and I am tired of standing before this brute. You can have weapon for now.” She seemed to put way to much emphases on the word now. “Just be careful Destiny, cause you have no idea what you are getting yourself into.”
“As long as she protected from you, than I know what I am getting into to.” Destiny turned around and watched as Jessica headed out of the room. Destiny followed her old friend, just staying ten feet back from her, until she fully left the hospital entrance. She stayed outside until a nice looking black truck drove out of the parking lot. It was then that she finally let out the breath she had been holding in. Her hand came to rest on her chest as took a large gulp of air. As she walked back to the cafeteria to get the file, she hoped it was still on the floor, it began to dawn on her what she had just done. She found herself leaning against the wall of the cafeteria and collapsed down to one knee. “Jesus Christ…” She almost couldn’t believe the next words that escaped from her mouth.
“I have a daughter again.”
177Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSAlHSy1Wht
