Nick leads us out of the auditorium and into what appears to be a lounge area in the Slayer Organization Headquarters. Nick leads the three of us over to one of the tables, where two kids my age sit, a girl and a boy, whom I'm assuming to be Jamie and Austin, respectively.
"Luis, Ella, Grover, meet Jamie and Austin. Jamie, Austin, meet Luis, Ella, and Grover. Now play nice you kids," Nick says.
Jamie is pretty tall for a girl, and muscular, too. Her hair is around shoulder length and chopped up at the bottom, it wasn't so much as blonde but more of a straight up yellow color, with dark green eyes. Jamie has a weird outfit on, a long yellow dress and sandals, covered in silver body armor. Chest pad, gauntlets, shoulder pads, anklets, and all. Jamie fiddles with an iron ball bearing in one hand, and a ball made out of rubber bands in the other.
As for Austin, he's about six feet tall, tall as Hell, for a kid my age. But I am just short. Austin has long blonde hair, long for a dude, at least, which partially covers his blue eyes, blue eyes even brighter than my own, underneath a pair of glasses, which Austin has a habit of adjusting. Austin wears a plain brown short sleeve shirt with a long sleeved white one underneath. On top of that, he sports a bright orange vest. Austin wears a matching orange handkerchief around his neck, as well as funky looking high tech looking goggles hanging from them. For his pants Austin wears normal black sweatpants with three white stripes going down each pant leg, and tucked into dark brown work boots that look covered in mud and grime. Attached to the belt loop of Austin's pants, is a shining silver chain with a gun-shaped keychain on the end. His left arm is completely wrapped up in a white cloth.
He's super tall and handsome, the girls probably love him. I hate him.
I see Austin peek at me out of the corner of his eyes, then turns to face me. "Why…are you looking at me like that?" He asks.
Oops, I accidentally let the blood lust get the better of me and began muttering obscenities at Austin.
"Now, now, you two, if we're going to be working as a team, we need to play nice," Nick says.
"Sure thing, dad," I grumble as I roll my eyes.
Nick is silent.
"What's the matter?" I ask as I turn to face Nick again.
"You can keep calling me "Dad"," Nick answers as a goofy grin spreads across his face, causing me to cringe.
"Now, I should probably explain what's going on here," Nick continues. "You five are part of the squad lead by me, and is thus called the "Slayer Hachi Squad." We will be assigned to protect all of Staten Island. As a squad, you will work as a team to carry out the missions that I assign you, whatever they may be. If we complete missions successfully, you will earn prestige."
"Prestige?" Austin asks.
"Yes, prestige," Nick answers. "Prestige is an intangible thing. Basically, if you five succeed in missions, especially difficult ones, you will have a higher amount of prestige, which will cause many eyes amongst the higher ups to be watching you. This will only be beneficial towards your futures working in this organization. If you have a lot of prestige, you will get promoted faster and have more job opportunities in the future."
"So basically, we fight, we win, the Chairman dude likes us, and we make more money, right?" I ask.
"Er…yeah," Nick answers.
"Great," I say as I crack my knuckles. "The money's why I'm here."
"Speaking of working as a team, it's important to know a little bit about each other. Your dreams and goals for the future would be nice, along with your likes, dislikes, and most important of all: your Cursed Ability," Nick explains. "Now, who would like to go first?"
Grover's hand shoots right up, flailing about to get Nick's attention. "Anyone else?" Nick asks, glancing around the room, only to be greeted with our blank faces. "Anyone at all?" Nick asks. No answer. "Oh, alright…" Nick sighs as he pinches the bridge of his nose. "Tell us a little about yourself, Grover."
As per usual, Grover pops up, places his fists on his hips and bellows: "MY NAME IS GROVER BRADSHAW, AND THE MAN THAT YOU ARE LOOKING AT RIGHT NOW IS GONNA BE THE NEXT CHAIRMAN OF THE SLAYER ORGANIZATION!" Grover booms.
Jamie and Austin cringe from the display, but Ella and I are more than used to it.
"That's nice, Grover," Nick replies, sounding annoyed after hearing that spiel for the hundredth time. "Why don't you instead focus a bit on telling us about your Cursed Ability?"
"Oh, yeah, that," Grover replies. "My Cursed Ability…it's the strongest one you'll ever see! It's called Wormhole and it gives me the ability to teleport through the portals that I create!" Grover explains. "But only when my hands are free!"
"That sounds like an incredibly valuable Cursed Ability to have at our disposal! Now, who's next…" Nick tries to continue, but Grover interrupts him.
"Which is why I was really mad when that guy shot my hand!" Grover snaps as he points an accusing figure towards Austin.
"I shot your hand?" Austin sneers back. "I grazed it with a bullet. Stop making such a big fuss over it."
Grover crosses his arms and pouts like a stubborn child.
"So while we're focused on you, Austin, do you mind introducing yourself? Your dreams? Your Cursed Ability? Etc," Nick asks.
"Heh heh…sure," Austin replies as he looks up and adjusts his glasses with his pointer finger, which begin to shine under the overhead lights. "My dream…" Austin begins to say. "IS MONEY!"
The rest of us are silent.
"Mo…money?" Nick stammers.
"I'm poor. I grew up poor, and my parents grew up poor. You see, I've always loved to invent things, especially tools that I can use in combat, such as these-" Austin begins to say, as he points to the goggles hanging around his neck. "If I can get recognition as a Pro Slayer, then so can my inventions, and I'll make it big as an inventor, and become rich. As for my Cursed Ability…I do mind. The less people who know my ability, the stronger of a weapon it'll be. The number one rule of thumb for Cursed Abilities user combat is discerning your opponents Cursed Ability."
"Yes, I understand that, but we need to know your Cursed Ability for our squad work," Nick sighs.
"Yes, yes, I know," Austin replies. "My Cursed Ability is called "Gunsmith." From anything from a shotgun to a sniper rifle to a machine gun, my Gunsmith can replicate any form of gun by using my Cursed Power, and fire off Cursed Power bullets. The only guns that I can't replicate are taser guns and flamethrowers, guns that don't use bullets. If my Cursed Power guns leave my hands, they simply vanish, they can't be wielded by anyone but myself. But trust me. My bullets can be felt by anyone."
I shiver at Austin's last line. For someone that I'm going to be working with, he sure does intimidate me.
"Alright, so a shooter class Cursed Ability, nice, nice," Nick says, before turning to Jamie. "I saw a bit of your Cursed Ability in the exams, but I'm not sure how it works exactly, mind sharing?"
"Right, sir! My name is Jamie Ebba! I don't care about rising in the ranks of the Slayer Organization or getting any recognition, or anything! I just want to have fun fighting strong opponents, and just…destress, once in a while. Now behold!" Jamie begins to say as she holds up her clenched hands. Jamie then opens her hands up, revealing the two small balls in her hands. "My Cursed Ability is called Adaptability! I can transform the texture of my body into anything it's touching, such as iron or rubber, hence these two balls. My Adaptability can transform my body into anything solid, but I don't think it will work on gasses or liquids. I'll have to try it out but that does seem a little scary, not being solid! My Adaptability isn't bound by the limits of the human body, so if I turn into rubber my entire body can stretch at will, if I turn into iron, my entire body gets fortified. It doesn't give me a strength boost so I can't like life heavy things, but all that iron will make my fists quite a bit stronger! Currently, I can't transform my entire body into iron or rubber, only partially. Those two are my specialties."
I thought Austin was scary, but boy, Jamie gives me the heebie-jeebies! For Jamie, fighting doesn't seem to be a necessary step to achieve her goals, like Austin or I, but rather…for fun?