Soho and I were navigating the city, moving along the back-end alleyways to avoid public sight. She'd tied the ripped mask around my face so I could maintain anonymity while she wore hers.
"The road this way has a lot of apartments along the east-end. Wanna check it out?" Soho asked me.
I nodded, eager to find a proxy colony as quickly as I could. I was afraid of being caught red-handed by A.X.A. right in the middle of downtown Melysia without Seris by our side. Using Ian's Fractal, Control, was the only thing that could give us a chance against them, granted by the vial of his blood.
"This way." Soho led me around the corner.
When we turned into the street, I immediately recognized it as one I'd scavenged before. Both ends of the road were lined with vendors and stalls—hundreds of them.
"Oh, shit." I lifted the mask on my face even higher than before.
"What's wrong?" Soho asked.
"I had a target from this area. Kassandra Watson. She had the Projection Fractal I was telling you about."
She looked at me with concern. "Was she from one of these stalls?"
I nodded. "We have to be even more cautious in this area."
We moved eagerly through the crowds, cutting through lines to get to the furthest end. I kept my mask high and my face low as to avoid recognition from the masses.
Have these people not seen the broadcast yet? If A.X.A.'s issued a 'Confinement Status,' shouldn't everyone be staying at home?
As we were soon approaching the end of the vendor's district of the road, a familiar sight had caught my eye. As opposed to the fiery blitz of flames I'd seen explode in the viral clip of Dante's prison escape, I'd caught glimpse of a flowing, smooth, wave of transparent motion moving around an individual who manipulated water with their hands. I'd seen him before, and had even tipped him a hundred dollars. Unlike the last time where he used water stored in a bucket, he was performing a demonstration of his water-manipulating Fractal using the puddles on the ground formed by the most recent rainfall instead.
He is very proficient at his Fractal.
Even Soho watched stunned for a moment. Like two innocent bystanders just passing-by for a second, we stopped to watch the intricate use of his Fractal alongside everyone else who surveyed. In the minute I found myself absorbed by his demonstration, images of the incoming inferno flashed through my mind, all while I watched the exact opposite flow before me.
Water can put out fire.
A threatening being, emitting fire in all directions—Dante Hade—was incoming. Seris would encounter him first, but even she established how overpowering his strength must have been in order to escape the Cube alone. I wanted to help out, but I knew I would only get in the way.
Dante's Fire Emission was an HP Fractal I knew I could not handle.
But what if we used a Fractal against his that could directly counter it?
Like firefighters fighting a fire, the most efficient way to put it all out was by extinguishing it with water. And standing right before me, manipulating water as if he were its creator, was a man who could give us the edge against Dante even if it were only slight. Forgetting about all of my concerns for anonymity in the moment, I approached the man as he finished his water-bending routine.
"You are incredible," I said, going in to shake his hand. My mask still covered my face, and I kept my gaze low, all so he wouldn't recognize me from before.
"T-Thank you, sir!" He was surprised by my sudden appearance and eagerness.
As we shook hands, I transferred from my palm to his a stack of bills, fully equating to a thousand dollars. In the quick exchange, I whispered in his ear.
"Tomorrow, the fields of the northern frontier will wither from a drought currently taking place. With your unparalleled way of water, I ask of you if there is any possible way to get as much precipitation in that region as possible, tomorrow."
He leaned back slightly to gaze at me for a moment. His eyes darted down at the cash and back at me.
"Are you being serious?"
The idea had already established itself in my mind. All I sought in this moment was clarification for its possibility. "You can have this grand, and in exchange, a rainfall in the northern frontier region, if at all, possible. Are your water capabilities that large?"
He looked down at his hands in contemplation. "I-It's possible. If I use my Fractal to simulate evaporation by raising as much water as I can back up into the clouds, surely, they'll rain by tomorrow. Even the wind blows north right now, so the clouds should situate in that region by then."
"Then is that a yes?"
He hesitated. "A-Are you sure? This is a lot of money…"
"It's for a good cause," I assured him. "The northern environment needs it."
That idea fixated him on the deal. "You're right. I'll do it. But this is still too much money, sir. I don't need any more than a ten."
I ushered the bills back into his hands. "Then you can have your ten, and the rest is a tip."
He caught glance of my single eye for a moment, reading into my iris as if he recognized me. Before he could conclusively thank me, I quickly turned away and disappeared into the crowd, rejoining Soho's side.
"Thank you…" I heard him say as I quietly walked away.
"What happened?" Soho asked as I returned.
"Just gained a little assistance for Seris up north."
I could tell that my vague answer had little to understand from Soho's point of view, so I washed it aside. "These are the apartments, right?"
We'd just gotten past the market crowd, and ahead of us were dozens of buildings that harbored tenants, and possibly, proxies.
"How do we determine which one harbors proxies?" I asked Soho.
"You might have to drink the vial and gain Ian's Fractal to sense it."
"Sense it?"
"With Control, once you emit a command, you should be able to tell if it applied to anybody. In the case of the proxies, since all of 'em are Absolutes, emitting a mental factor of Control would bounce off of them since they've already been brainwashed to the max. You'd be able to sense that."
"Then I could use the physical Control factor to take control of them fully, right?"
"I think so. There's only been so much I've picked-up on about Ian's Fractal over the years."
I sighed. "Then we're just gonna have to find out."
As we moved forward towards the block of apartments, a commotion began to take place back in the market crowd behind us. Tones were raised, and people began moving quickly.
"A.X.A. issued a Confinement Status!" I heard someone yell out. "Apparently there's a serial killer on the loose!"
Oh, shit. They've only just seen the news now?
"We gotta move quickly," I told Soho.
She nodded, and we rushed forward. In the palm of my hand, I gripped the vial of Ian's blood tightly. Soon would be the time where I could finally blend-in with the rest of Melysia for once, even if just for a moment.
I was going to wield a Fractal as a Fractless.
"Let's start here." Soho pointed to the first apartment we came across.
I opened my hand, revealing the sweat-smeared glass vial of blood I'd anxiously held in my palm until now.
"Drink it," she told me.
My heart began to race. Sweat dripped from my forehead, and my body trembled from both fear and excitement. Adrenaline rushed through my veins, and soon, Ian's DNA would too. Looking at the building that stood tall before me, ever-so reminiscent of the moment before stepping into that apartment from the past, I gripped the vial tightly to erase my fears and swallow my regrets. Soon, I was going to step-up onto the biggest stage to confront a previous comrade, a former mentor, and a present rival.
Numbers are the only way I'll be able to stand up against Enzo. I need this.
Any thoughts or sentiments that tried to hold me back in this moment were swallowed away in a desperate gulp. I took one deep breath, and popped the cork off the vial.
This isn't for Melysia or Heathen's sake anymore. This is for my own sake now.
To defy all the odds that were soon to be thrown my way in my exposure, I cocked my head back and drank the blood in an instant.
Gulp.
Shivers immediately shot throughout my body as it burned its way down my throat. It was viscous, heavy, and absolutely rancid. In the flash of just a few seconds, I saw color erase itself from the world I saw through my eye, save for a darkening red aura that overtook my sight.
Foreign.
An enigmatic voice spoke into my head and startled me, paralyzing me in place.
You are not my child.
The words were unintelligible, yet I could understand exactly what the voice was trying to portray. For a moment, as a hallucination, I saw a bright white sphere appear in the sky, frowning down on me from above. Then, in the same instant, all had gone back to normal. The colors returned to the greyscale world, and the vision of the sky had disappeared. My eye strained from the toll of whatever delusion had just taken place on my mind. Soho looked at me with concern, realizing that something had happened as I swallowed Ian's blood.
"Klyson? Are you okay?"
I coughed from the horrid aftertaste left in my mouth by the blood, but I waved off Soho's concern.
"It just tasted bad. Don't worry."
But in my mind, I'd shudderingly understood what I'd just witnessed.
So that's what Ian meant when he said his capabilities were 'ethereal.'
What I'd seen wasn't just an illusion. It was a momentary lapse in both space and time to introduce me to the deity that must have been living in Ian all of this time.
That was MONA, Herself.
For the approaching amount of time before my next excretion, I held the privilege to both Ian's Fractal, Control, and the presence of the Moon goddess of Menesism, MONA.
"Let's go in."
I stepped into the first apartment out of the rest down the street, simply because my intuition presumed that something awaited me there. Standing in the empty lobby, I was reminded of the facts I'd picked-up on during that apartment assault from the past.
Ian's Fractal was in effect throughout the whole building, from top to bottom.
My hypothesis had been set, and was ready to test. Using my newly acquired Fractal, I ultimately spoke the first command.
"Stomp."
Without delay soon after my word, a tremor of stomps echoed throughout the whole entire building that I stood in.
"Oh my god." Soho looked at me with shock. "You actually did it…"
It seemed that I had found my proxy colony.