The broad and greying man was walking to a secluded area of the school, it had been a long time since he had spoken to his student, and a long time since he had seen Juniper Fay.
It was hard to meet her a lot because of the restrictions in place for her, even though she could break them and at most receive a verbal reprimanding, Noa, as a monarch faced similar restrictions.
But of course he had a lot more leeway, he just wasn't allowed to leave the country unless it was mandated by both the BPA that he is the head of and the government of the states and whatever country he feels like going to.
He didn't care for travelling much anyway.
"Teach?" And there she was, one of his only students, Carmen Ford. He took her on as an apprentice so she didn't have any teammates, but that was probably for the better, she was inherently selfish.
When he sent her out on missions with other teams she shown that she liked to steal the show.
"Long time no see punk." His fist met the top of her head as he made a mess of her hair.
Carmen pushed his hand off and gave him a dead stare.
"Could have went longer..." She said sarcastically elongating the 'r'.
There was no problems between the two, they just had different duties, and Noa. Well he was a problem of his own, when he had first taken in Carmen she seemed to spot everything about him that people just viewed as his charm and charisma and told him what it really was.
It left Noa with a permanent sting, not of hate or an unexplained emotion. Just a quiet and strange affliction of grief.
"I thought you were gone already, your speech is over."
"Gone without seeing my student." He replied.
Carmen gave a stare and then raised her eyebrow as if questioning if he had any underlying intentions.
"Also heard you got quite the interesting student."
At that her gaze hardened, Noa felt better now.
"No need for such a harsh glare, I already knew of Theon before he came here, even met him a few times. I was the one who appointed Victor as his benefactor."
There was a glint of suspicion in her eyes, Noa wasn't really hiding anything from her though. Just a few minor things like how he didn't even know where the boy came from, and that Victor already had him by his side promising that the boy would make a great paladin in time.
Noa knew he should have done more investigating earlier on, Victor had led a small team near some dockyards in Florida and then they come out with a bunch of missing persons and researchers that were put in jail but mysteriously died weeks later.
Noa knew of Grid.
"So you know of his unique circumstances?" She asked.
Noa nodded, he knew she would have more questions but he didn't plan on answering them. So he interjected with some small increments.
"I also know who the overseer is and how she came up with the thought to bring Grid into existence."
"She?" Carmen
"The Pooka," Carmen raised her brow and then it quickly set into an unsettling surprise. Her face was now covered in worry and fear, she didn't know where to take the conversation after hearing a name that hadn't been heard in so long.
"Thousand-eyed Pooka?" She had to ask for clarification and Noa nodded,
The 'thousand-eyed pooka' real name, Maeve O'Malley. She was a true demon given human form.
She is someone that the records are certain has been alive for a near 180 years. This was something only confirmed to be possible after the BPA had figured out her paranormal power; Parasite.
It allowed her to store people in her cells, gaining everything about them, down to power, cells, and life-spans.
"Is she still missing?" Carmen asked.
Noa nodded his head and he could see the disappointment on his students face.
"She surrendered four years ago."
More surprise made it's way to Carmen's face.
"Isn't that something to be celebrated? Shouldn't paladin and the public have known?" She asked with her shoulders pushed up along with her eyebrows causing some forced wrinkles on her forehead.
"Again, no. Reason being, all the people she has stored within her are still alive. And so that would count for some loved one's, civilian, paladin or criminal. The public would ask for their release. Something that can only be done by the demon itself, and since the possibility is there that she could free them at anytime she has been placed in a specialized prison just for her with guards keeping watch twenty-four-seven."
Obviously it were paladin, but that didn't mean anything against someone who could pick a new power to use the instant she seen her odds were better with it.
She must have been spawned from hell to be as ruthless as she was, to even come up with Grid. Before Carmen spoke Noa filled her in on something else.
"She's asleep now and has been since she surrendered, she put herself in some suspended animation and we haven't been able to wake her up."
"Any idea why?"
Noa shrugged his shoulders much to her greater dissatisfaction. "All we know is we do not want her out in any circumstances, and if she finds a way out the objective is to immediately kill."
Obviously, she had killed squads of paladin during a time she was known to everyone. Now people just believe that the boogeyman has gone to sleep, hibernation if you will. And they believe that her return will mark the end of peace, unless the great monarch deals with her.
As his student, Carmen knows that Noa has had his own run-ins with the thousand eyed killer a few times himself, she had never seen them and the reports were completely sealed, so the number of those that knew were far-in-between.
Carmen raised her head to Noa and asked, "Do you know why she built Grid?"
This time there was no disappointment from her, Noa nodded and gave her a reply that didn't soothe her ears.
"The idea came when she decided she wanted to create a specific ability after she failed to get to the body before the child died in Spain." It was just for some power she couldn't have, "The girl was no older than twelve from what I know, her power awakened early and it allowed her to create beings or objects from her art."
That sounded powerful, but to Carmen she imagined it as painting something simple on air, something Noa had to correct.
"The kid could paint something, like a dog, then she could design it with a unique power and even give it a backstory, once she gave it her personalized seal she could then bring it to life."
The image in Carmen's head was now changing, she could see it now. A power like that would be bad in the hands of someone like Maeve O'Malley. It would be bad in most people's hands.
As long as one was creative... she didn't even want to think of the rest. But there must have been restrictions.
"How would she get the ability if she starts Grid?" That is something Carmen was worried but also interested about. "Powers are almost never the same even when there is relation, only chance is by twin."
"Yeah, she tried to replicate the child's power. Thought she could use the child's body as a blueprint... create the power anew through cloned DNA."
Carmen raised her eyebrow while leaning on the windowsill, "Her DNA?"
"Yes," Noa Confirmed. "Maeve believed that if she could create a new body with the same genetic makeup, the power would re-emerge. It had never been tried before until she started Grid."
The idea sat heavily in the air, and Carmen was shook her head in disbelief, the conversation carried on and it confused her some,
"We retrieved her notes," Noa continued. "The first generation—shortened lifespans and other defects. It only got better a few generations later when she made them all mate with people who had no ties to her experiments. Those children were normal."
It all clicked. Her mind connected the dots, and she whipped her gaze to Noa. He nodded, confirming the thought bubbling within,
"Yes. Theon Abara is just one of the few people that has that girls DNA within him."
Carmen felt a sharp breath catch in her throat. Her pulse quickened, and the weight of his words crushed her. Maeve's experiments had created something that never should have existed—like a puppet.
Noa spoke again, his voice distant, "Not everyone from Grid's last generation carries it. By then the system had become a breeding ground— a place where Maeve could find, cultivate and acquire new powers in peace, especially after she secured government backing."
The anger began to boil in Carmen's chest. Disappointment. Betrayal. Power-hungry monsters. She could feel it all, thick and suffocating in her veins.
But then, as quickly as it came, the anger faded, leaving behind a sinking feeling. The things people do for power.
Noa had placed a hand on her shoulder and tried kindly comforting her, it just felt wrong to her. She turned to him and Noa could see her green eyes clouded in a pitiful expression.
"Why did you tell me this?"
"He's your student, you should know certain things about him that he may want answers for one day."
Carmen exhaled sharply, the weight of everything falling on her. From everything she could gather about Theon, he was a quiet, closed-off person, the kind who hid his heart from others.
He was mindful, always aware of how he responded, but there was a sadness beneath the surface.
He had no clear direction. He just... existed, letting life take him where it would.
And now, she realized, he hadn't simply been born like the others. He had been made. A creation, a tool for someone's dark ambition, meant to be used and discarded. He wasn't free. Maeve's legacy had stolen that from him.
Noa's voice broke through her thoughts, "Don't stress over it too much," he said. "Just be there for him. You're his one and only mentor after all."
Carmen nodded, her heart heavy with a new understanding.
___
That phone,
Theon brought out a phone that he had been hiding in his room.
'I had no time to properly take a look at it.'
It was also hard to find a charger for it, the one he had thought worked on it didn't, the phone was nearly eight years old, and for tech in this world that is a very long time.
He pressed the power button and watched the phone flicker to life, it's screen lit up with a feint blue glow. Theon squinted at the old cracked display, unsure if it would even work properly.
The sound of the phones start-up echoed in the silence of his room.
It was locked with a passcode, this wasn't a problem for Theon. With Revelation he is guided to the right answer to unlock it.
He tapped four numbers-8471- and was then brought to the main screen that showed a few simple apps that every phone had, messaging app, a camera, and a browser, among others.
But what caught Theon's attention was an app that had a logo that looked awfully familiar. He clicked into it and then realized that there was no service, he could still play around with the app and see old data, he then found out it was a paladin website.
An old layout for old software.
So the person who owned the phone was a paladin.
Theon tapped the icon, curiosity piqued as he waited for the page to load. Eventually the page loaded, and it showed an old picture of a man, or teenager with sharp facial features and tanned skin. Dark black hair and radiant blue eyes,
Below it said his name was Maxim Remus and that he was from Greece!? At the time aged seventeen.
Theon blinked, his mind reeling. Greece.
The entire country disappeared eight years ago, along with it's people. It was an occurrence that made no sense at the time. Soon after a massive tower had appeared, stretching impossibly high, it's peak lost in the clouds.
The people of Greece, as it was later confirmed, were still alive, trapped in the tower. But there was no entrance. No way out.
Theon paused recalling what little information he had found online. The tower's appearance was a mystery, and there were no confirmed records of anyone coming out. But rumours persisted; once every three months, on the tenth day, there was a supposed way inside.
The information was vague at best, and many had tried to find answers but none succeeded.
"But there were other complications with that." He muttered to himself.
As a paladin, one was licensed to use their power to engage with supernatural threats in their own country. To operate outside, you needed another licence as well as to be in your second year of the paladin institute or apprentice program.
And now with this phone in his hand, semi-perfectly in tact, that could confirm whether someone has made it out.
"Should I tell someone?"
The thought lingered in his mind. The world hadn't forgotten about Greece, but people had moved on. The land had become little more than a tourist attraction.
He clicked on another tab that said "Bounty Board". And he was greeted to a list of names and pictures, of paladin as well as other awakened that earned a place here.
He read the brief description at the top of the page: The majority of the people listed are here to outline the danger levels of individuals or groups who may pose a risk to the country a Paladin resides in—essentially, war potential.
It was all dated of course, and since it belonged to a Greek it would only highlight everyone outside of Greece.
Theon never seen anything like this on his paladin phone, he thought on asking Carmen, until his scrolling stopped right on her name.
The information was dated but it was clearly the name Carmen Ford, her black hair shorter and tied in a loose ponytail, her green eyes were unmistakeable. Age at the time, sixteen. And the price on her head was... 20 million euros.
A lot of money for a teenager. Theon scrolled further and seen some recognizable names and even some X'd out, signifying death.
It was old, the phone was so old now that it felt disconnected from anything modern, like it would be a relic to be posted on an auction site.
He turned it off and was slowly starting to lose interest. He wondered why his revelation made him pocket it back on his first mission.
There was something pulling at him to still keep it secret, at least for a while. He wanted to fight against that, Theon pulled out a coin.
"If it lands heads I'll tell, tails I'll keep quiet."
.
.
.
He rolled his eyes at the absurdity. It was stupid, whenever he flipped a coin it would always land on the side his revelation's mystical tug would side with so he doesn't even know why he bothered.
He pulled open his top drawer on his desk and slid the phone underneath the gap in place and closed it.
'No need to continue messing around with a pointless relic.'
He had a team meeting to get to now.
___
"We have to what?" Jon asked incredulously, there was more annoyance that disbelief though.
Carmen repeated what she had just told the three of them.
"We're going to the main hospital to aid in recovery, as well as transporting people to the general hospital that may need it."
Theon noticed that his teacher was acting strangely, he didn't know how to put it but she just looked a lot more drained.
He doesn't really like the idea of going to a hospital, but he did think that asking her about healing with OD would be a good chance in a hospital.
"You guys will need to get used to seeing more of the brutal side of the job."
The brutal side, the violence was brutal enough in Theon's opinion. Seeing chimera stomp through districts and then potentially fighting people that just had a bad day... Yeah, it was all brutal enough.
Or did she want them all to see dead bodies?
No, her reasoning was so that we understand what is at stake each and every time we go out in uniform.
A nasty thought made it's way into Theon's mind, one about not reacting much at all to a dead body. But he was comforted when he thought Jon may be in the same boat.
"Okay then, hey do we know anymore about how Charlie Liber and his group travelled so far without anyone knowing?" Jon asked, he was leaning with his back against the wall and face looking to the sky.
On first glance it would look like he was just tired, but a gut feeling led Theon to thinking it was more than that. Fear, guilt, worry.
"Yeah, it was a man named Lucian Lovejoy," It was slight, so incredibly slight but Theon noticed Jon flinch.
Not the same flinch that Bell gave from the recognition of the name, his was more of fear,
"He's from an elite assassin group called Jacob's Guild. And from what we know he is their strongest member, even surviving some run-ins with our monarch."
Theon had looked up information on the guild back when Jon had first told him about his past.
The information was scarce, it would just amount to how efficient they are and how they have a ninety-nine percent success rate.
Information on the people was even more rare. Lucian Lovejoy was the only recurring name, no images of him though.
"But there's no need to worry they only work for money and they seem like they are just trying to get off their feet again after the last raid nearly took out a great number of them."
"So Charlie Liber had money to pay them off."
She nodded, "Yeah, but the services of someone of a rank that high is not cheap so there is no reason to believe he will show again. And since the organization's numbers have dwindled they probably won't sacrifice anyone that they still have left."
...lest they want to lose their business.
Theon thought on it for a moment, about how natural but strange for their to be an entire organization of assassins out there.
But, a world so vast with a variety of powers, it only made sense that organizations like that existed.
Carmen clapped her hands, "Let's get going!"