Ashley's mouth agape in amazement and fear as she watched Brandon take a bite of the apple that had sprung from his skin on his tummy just a minute before. The fruit was red and appealing to the sight. Alice broke the stillness with a yawn and added:
"He was my problem for a whole hour, can you watch whiles I grab some dinner for us to eat and discuss the next step to this… display of abomination?" She motions with her hand, expressing contempt and disinterest.
Alice sprang off the second story balcony and landed quickly as she dashed towards the city, leaving only a trail of smoke.
Ashley stood there, finally composed herself, and added:
"Please stop eating your skin fruit"
Brandon arched an eyebrow to look funny and patted his belly when he heard that:
"That is the last one," he said, eating the apple whole, including the string and seeds, then getting up from the counter and waving his hand:
"Hey Ashley, something funny happened to me"
Ashley looked at her with blatant malice and said:
"Why didn't you answer your Pager?"
"I lost it"
"Where?"
"The sewers, I think"
"And is that where you lost your clothes as well?"
"Yep"
"Why were you seating on counter where I make food with your behinds exposed?"
Brandon gave her a sneaky smirk.
"Come on right, I know you and Alice do your nighty activities sometimes on this counter…"
Before proceeding, a small flick of red energy flew directly at Brandon's face; however, because the curse body was active, he was able to dodge the blast with a tilt of his head because his sight never left Ashley's.
"Keep going, and I won't miss again," she replied, placing her purse on a looming chair near the television.
'Wait, didn't I dodge her?' Brandon pondered as the effects of the curse body faded.
The living room and kitchen were identical to those in the Wilson residence; they were adjoined and served as both a living space and a food preparation space; there was a three-seater couch adorned in black with white, black, and fluffy pink cushions on the seats. A marble counter with a sink, a wooden knife holder holding several knives, and a vegetable holder containing tomatoes, cabbages, and onions.
Ashley glanced at Brandon's body as he stood there with a stiff face and body, terrified of the beam ray firing again. Ashley touched Brandon's body, which sent chills down his stiff body, gradually calming and letting go of the steel resolve.
She touched Brandon's hands and arms slowly and gently as she inspected his body, she touched his abs without her face turning crimson at all, and she stopped there by pinching him on the cheek and saying:
"Your hands and part of your arms feel hollow and empty, as if there is no bone or muscle at all. "Why is that?"
Brandon shook his body like he was feeling the shivers as the vines and leaves vanished, leaving a purple cloud that retreated into Brandon's body like a vacuum cleaner sucking dust into the associated bag.
Then his eyes went purple with an ethereal brilliance, dimmed, and returned to deep blue. Brandon looked at Ashley, who was stunned by the entire incident. Brandon grinned and added:
"To answer your question I lost my arms, hands and legs to a hungry vampire"
Ashely became serious as she passed the counter and onto the fridge, grabbed for the refrigerator door, opened it, pulled a bottle of wine, pulled the cork, drank the wine with bottle as she grabbed a bottle along the way and added:
"Tell me everything; I might phone your dad and tell him you'll be with us for a while. go wear something before we begin; please don't mess up our room and don't look in the drawers next to the bed. Wear one of my robes or Alice's, because I am staring to get tired of looking at that abomination of yours"
Brandon smiled and added, as he left:
"Oh well, I will say that the story is both good and eye opening for us since it has important information for Alice as well as me"
Brandon took a short peek at Ashley and added inwardly:
'I suppose I am still interested in adult women with controlled emotions, but Brandon's body reacts differently; he doesn't even get a boner when he sees these ladies when he visits; is his lasting memories inhibiting profound desire for those he perceives as sisters? I know they're not related at all; therefore, he must consider them family, right. No surprise they are enraged and free around him; perhaps he discovered excellent friends after his grief from Matthews' betrayal. Oh well, I need to find out more about this gift of mine, Void has been pretty recently since I escaped the sewers'
He entered the room and shut the door. After a while, he arrived in a yellow nightgown with lambs on his left breast like a badge. H sniffed it and said, with hints of realization:
"This is Alice's, right?"
"Yes, it is, and stop sniffing it," Ashley remarked as she grabbed a glass and motioned to the couch. 'Had no plans like that?' Brandon mused as he shook his head.
Brandon sat on the couch with Ashley, refused to drink the wine, and narrated his story. He describes how the vampire chased him down to the roofs, then body slammed him to the concrete ground with the intent to inflict damage on the enemy, not caring about his body's damage as long as the vampire was damaged until someone came to rescue him, and how he woke up with his arms and legs missing and eaten.
He still pondered how he kept the pain inside, either owing to the numbing argent from the saliva or the crystallization effects of the blood turning to crystals. He wasn't sure and would ask Ashley when she returns.
Brandon told her that he was saved by the sewer water, which transported him to a big place built a long time ago, an abandoned construction he dubbed the Cylinder, which he felt was a filtration facility that had been abandoned.
Brandon said that he wanted to die there until the rat told him that he was going to die by his hand, this motivated Brandon to try something even if he was weak. He left out the part of him being moved by his memories about his being a soldier from earth being the catalyst of his survival.
So, while he was preoccupied trying to come up with a solution, he heard something moving toward him that sounded like something rolling to gain movement or something moving with mucus like a snail or slug that resembled blood. The object appeared strange and repulsive to the naked sight; it contained several eyeballs that assisted in movement and a red liquid that moved differently due to the fact that it's an animal.
The liquid flowed to his mouth and down his neck; he swallowed it to avoid choking. Brandon had to lie, he didn't talk about the voice in the void, the factor core he got and the tree-like thing in his mind, the pulsing pain when he has a thought to look at something within that place, and finally, he described the power he had used, which involves the use of certain types of plants.
Following his account of what happened, Ashely grinned and said,
"Congratulation Bran, you have a factor"
Brandon enquired, perplexed:
"A what?" pretending of course, he had an inkling about what is a factor core, he just wanted another explanation of it from a different perspective.
"You don't know what a factor core is?"
Bran nodded his head, indicating that he knew a bit, while Ashley sighed and drank from the glass into which she had poured the wine. She moistened her lips and continued:
"A factor is a manifestation of your born power; it can evolve anytime you gain an understanding of the power, such as how your body should use it when it is within you or how you intend to use it to further your path of progress toward ascending. There are other types of factors that I can use as examples, such as the healing factor. This factor is used for healing, but in order to use it effectively, you must first grasp the type of healing you comprehend as the user"
"You can heal someone by preparing food for them; you can also heal someone by having them interact with your body; some people need to taste something you've made or touched, etc. The cornerstone of this aspect is your ability to heal anyway you see fit. You can heal by f**king someone or by being f**cked yourself. It's different, but there are also elements like vampires that can achieve so much more as they progress, such as a vampire in first class who can heal by feeding their leader's blood or their parents. Their component allows them to not be involved in a single skill, such as healing; instead, it has multiple variations that can open healing abilities such as the former.
"So, what I am trying to tell you is that there some factors that can do multiple task that aren't involved in one ability but several."
Ashely finished and drank from the glass, leaving Brandon with his thoughts as he attempted to build an understanding. He twitched abruptly, realizing that his thought was still there, and uttered the following:
"The variety portion I recognize that your factor ability centers on bodily fluid discharges like perspiration and mucus. You can expel bodily fluids from your body, which has various features and variations. You can use it to stick to surfaces, such as walls, to assist you climb them, or to explode when needed, but you can't use it to construct weapons to fight with unless you know how to do so. Vampires' skills concentrate upon blood, and they can weaponize it by creating claws and swords and using it to cure the body in the usual way rather than magically."
"Imagination, thus, determines the factors that determine an ability's use, including when and how to use it, as well as how it affects the target or body when employed. That may explain how I can replace my limbs with wooden ones, but I can't make them look like they used to because I haven't understood the aspect that can let me birth muscles and skin cells that replicate like a human.
Brandon looked to his hand and added:
"Guess I finally have a factor but at the same time, I am scared of it"
"How so?"
"I am a Half-breed, and if people discover that my factor has been unsealed, I will be captured, and sealed forever this time, they will do it out of dread of the Lost Age returning. I believe I should keep it a secret and continue about my business as long as no one tries to do a checkup yet."
Ashley remained quiet for a moment, then shrugged:
"You wanted power and now you got, so you are okay with hiding it?"
Brandon said with a smile. "Yes, I have to until I find a better solution to hide it as go for my third and final year then I can leave the academy and become a mercenary for hire… if I can or a retirement home nurse to look after my dad"
"Wow that was a goal, and you thought of it as you were coming here huh, for a minute there I thought you would be scared shit less when you found that you got some unknown factor of a pile of moving shit"
Brandon looked at Ashley with a raised eyebrow. "You sound like Alice; guess you are drunk huh"
Ashley smiled and added: "Of course I am; a serious talk needs a serious drink"
"Anyways I need to go home right now, how is dad doing?"
"He walks but can't work, Hehe I just heard myself rhythm"
Brandon laughed and said inwardly, 'Look at that Bran, we have a factor." We have the ability to improve our lives, but we must keep it a secret. Damn, this is going to be tough!'
Brandon requested Ashley's phone number and contacted the name of a neighboring transportation service. Alice returned with snacks and instructed Brandon to put Ashley to bed as she passed out drunk, remove her favorite nightgown and obtain some clothing from the charity bag outside, which Brandon did. Ashley was already knocked out sleeping; perhaps she can't handle her liquor, pondered Bran.
Going outside, he rode the elevator to the donation bin where he located several garments, most of which, to his dismay, were ripped, wet, and stench filled. Since this was the male clothing, he proceeded to the female sector to find some pants that were undamaged.
He found everything he needed, returned to Ashley and Alice's room, and discovered Alice eating steak with a full bottle of the wine Ashley was drinking. Alice smiled as she saw what Brandon had chosen; she wanted to laugh but kept her cool and continued to eat as Brandon walked to the restroom, removed the nightgown, and wore his bargain attire; he didn't judge.
Brandon proceeded to the adjacent living room, sat at the counter, and said:
"What do you know of the vampire I killed?"
Alice recalls Brandon obtaining his factor by eating a lot of mysterious meat, which he then used to slay the vampire, leaving only bone dust. Alice had a nibble of the meat and drank from her glass. "The vampire is a class four based on the powers he demonstrated; he is from the organization if I guess correctly. I don't know many with that description; I'll look into it."
"Thanks as always, Alice"
She licked her fingers with the juice from the meat and added:
"No problem; just be careful out there. They may be quiet right now, but they will get active once you start creating noise. They claim you stole something from them that they will eventually reclaim; they are only waiting for you to make a move to use it, and when you do, you will die beside your father. They would not come after you as long as I am present, and Ashley will keep an eye on your father's well-being until the situation enables us to move rapidly. Keep your head down, okay?
While Lesley was pleased that Brandon's father and well-being were being attended to by these two women, as Brandon he was curious as to why they were doing so. 'Damn you Brandon, you made a mess that cannot be cleansed easy,' he thought silently, considering the women as spies for Agent 6, and the only card to his survival is discovering what he had stolen from them that they are ready to wait for him to make a move and are quite for.
Brandon smiled as he heard the sound of a horn honking, then said his goodbyes and went. Alice ate the steak and added, as she heard the elevator open, thanks to her extraordinary hearing:
"Who are you, body snatcher?" You and I both know you are not the real Brandon Wilson, but we'll have to wait and see how your act ends before I find out the truth. But right now, I can only look for the dead vampire through my contacts on the inside." As she spoke, she continued to devour the steak and drink the glass of wine.
***
Brandon was taking a taxi home while mulling over how to train his newfound strength. Suddenly, he heard a voice from within:
"Hey, kid or man, as you like. Anyway, come check this out; I need to explain something to you.
Brandon closed his eyes and moved into the space between the radiating sphere and the black place.
Author's note: (There is a reference to Redo-healer in this chapter, if you didn't watch it. Do yourself a favor, don't read it and avoid it at all costs if you can't handle it. But if you know Berserk, maybe you will be fine when you watch it).