MM Ch. 4

MM Ch. 4

Chapter Four: The Friendship

The stranger Jen had come to call "Him" had departed from her side with a peculiar black box to the side of his face: guessably, it was some sort of phone or communication device, though it looked far too outdated compared to the rest of the city, which seemed to have quite the headstart with technology. She hadn't any intention to eavesdrop on Him, and had even turned her head in the opposite direction, in admiration of the city. Yet, and especially from his distance, few words were picked up anyway, ranging anywhere from "I need you down here as soon as possible", to "I don't care what eggplant you use!" Clearly, he was familiar with whom he was speaking... and Jen could only hope that it wasn't that bizarre Dameon again... though she shuddered at the thought of the stereotypical man having anything to do with eggplant.
"You'll be outta this place soon enough..." The sudden voice rather startled Jen, her head lifting and whipping around to face Him. He managed a bit of a smile at her behaviour, tucking that communication device back past the oversized tail of his shirt and into his left pants pocket. "I've arranged for someone to come pick you up as soon as possible. I hope you don't mind, but you should stay with us for a while."
"But... but what about that other man? Dameon?" Her head craned this way and that in search of the familiar face... they were allies, right? Dameon and Him?
"I wouldn't worry about Dameon... knowing him, he's on his way back to The House as we speak."
The House? That just rose further questions. The curiousity must've been strong in her eyes as she stared toward Him, for Him reclaimed his seat on that slanted metal bench beside her.
"Our headquarters, for lack of a better description... we call it The House..." Him lifted one hand, pushing it back through his golden locks. "I keep forgetting... you're a newbie to all this..."
It was as if the words had given some cue, for a small red vehicle looking as if it wouldn't be able to withstand more than four people screeched to a halt only a few feet from their seating area. Him stood to his feet, his overlengthed hair cascading over his shoulders, and Jen just turned her head toward the transportation unit.
It looked like a regular car, one no different than the ones she'd seen back in her own time; for wheels, five tainted windows, two on each side and one in the back, a windshield... right down to the windshield wipers...
All familiarity was lost, however, as the door on the side of that vehicle closest to them opened: not like a normal door would open, more like a sliding to one side and upward, like in the science fiction movies. It was rather bizarre and unexpected, however, to find that the steering wheel, stickshift gear, driver-- and passenger seats had all been built... into the back of the vehicle.
Their chauffer seemed to fit the out-of-place car. She was a certain female; she had the stature, the feminine frame, face, and figure... she... just... didn't quite look like someone anyone should actually get into a car with. Some sort of mutated human, certainly: large pointed shapes sticking out the sides of her head where her ears should've been, skin a peculiar shade of dark purple, hair a complete invert, the silver strands pulled back in a loose braid hanging well down her spine. She hunched foward over that steering wheel, one hand clasped to the stickshift beside her.
"Ah... Conan... so this is the woman you said the syndicate was after?" She turned her attention toward Him as she spoke, a heavy European accent in her voice as she uttered the words. German, perhaps... the peculiar usage of "z" and "v" sounds tipped that off. Jen had to give her points; clearly she hadn't known the English language all too long, and had already basically mastered the usage of words... now if only it was comprehendable...
But... Conan?! Was that really Him's name? It was a rather unorthodox choice for a name, one she'd rarely ever seen outside the leprechaun talk show host. She managed to turn her head from the car driver who looked more like a character from an RPG toward the man she'd grown so accustomed to calling "Him", as if looking for verification of the validity of the former's statement.
Well, if it wasn't his name, he certainly made no indication that he minded being called by it.
"Yeah, this is her..." He, too, pried his eyes from the car, looking down toward Jen and clasping a firm hand to her shoulder. "She says she's from Earth... I'm guessing the syndicate found out somehow and are trying to run some tests on her, or something..."
No... that was wrong... it had something to do with that river thingie that what's-his-face had scolded her for falling into. Not like it was really her fault...
"From Earth, she said? Well, I'd certainly like to perform a couple experiments on her myself!"
"Annelise! Truly, you sound more like a deranged scientist than a doctor!"
Annelise. It was another of those names. Whose name was Annelise? Let alone that Jen was still in shock from hearing "Conan"., and God knows, she hadn't heard the name Dameon since The Omen! God, that was a frightening movie... she shuddered at the thought of it...
"If she really is from Earth, there's gotta be something about her! It's not deranged, it could be a breakthrough in the long-slowed evolution of the human race!" That was a shocker, coming from a purple elf chick. "Now, if you two aren't getting in, I'm turning around and heading back to The House!"
Jen hesitated a moment... she hadn't really meant to seem rude... it was just a bit unsettling, thinking of herself entering that car, with strangers nonetheless. At least they didn't give her promises of candy and presents.
She didn't have much time to hesitate; Conan grabbed a hold of her left arm, leading her toward that car. Rather than fighting him and risk a bad bruise, she followed along, slipping into the front seat and sliding over toward the leftmost window... where the driver's seat should've been. Hell, for all she knew, she in the back of the car!
Conan slid in beside her and that door fell to a closing, giving a small clicking sound that almost definately signified locking, locking in the leathery scent that had come to represent new car, and the vehicle started moving again. Just as Jen suspected; the car was driving in reverse... well, Hell, if living on Earth was a crime, then anything could happen! Her dreamland, her rules.
"I guess I should apologize for not introducing myself earlier..." Conan's voice had snapped Jen from her daydream of the peculiar world, turning her head once again to face him. A bit of a sheepish grin had been plastered to his face, and he held out one hand, as if looking for a greeting handshake, to which Jen complied, slipping her own hand into his and giving it a gentle up and down movement. "I'm... Conan Yukyi, second-in-command of Regnum Noctis... known as the 'anti-syndicate'." He hesitated a moment, gaze falling toward the ground and lifting back toward her again. "We're... against the actions of Black Thunder..." He held her hand a moment longer, as if making certain that their friendly shake had set in before withdrawing his hand once again.
So his name was Conan. If she'd been bolder, she'd've asked permission to call him "Him".
"Ah-- Jennifer Kvalko.... it's a pleasure I'm sure.... Mr. Yukyi..."
"No need for formalities..." His head tilted toward one side, that hand she'd only recently let go draping over his lap, resting knucles-down on the car seat beside him. He repeated her first name over again, staring up at the ceiling of that car, looking to be rather deep in thought, before turning back toward her. "You wouldn't happen to have a nickname, would you?"
"I, ah... my-- some of my classmates used to call me Jen..."
"Then Jen it is..." That hand clamped again to her shoulder, lips parting in a kind grin toward her before turning over his shoulder at their chauffer. "She's Annelise Iriem... Regnum Noctis' medic..." Slowly did he turn around again, azure eyes landing on Jen's visage once again. "Don't worry; you'll get used to her accent in time..."
"But... why is she...?" That accent was the last thing on Jen's mind, and then some! The bizarre colouring of the other woman's skin, for one, set her nerves on edge.
"Why is she what?" He looked back and forth between the two women a couple times, finally bringing his gaze to rest on Jen. "Purple?" A laugh issued from his throat, an action that rather startled Jen into leaning backward ever slightly, a hand resting against her chest. "Annelise is a Drow: a dark elf. They're normally nocturnal creatures, and are quite intelligent." His gaze lifted again, toward the driver. "Our gal Annelise broke the nocturnal habit, adopting human sleeping patterns as her own... makes things easier for her to tend to her patients. She does seem to get more energy as the night grows closer, though, still..."
If Annelise heard them at all, she paid them no heed, just keeping her eyes on the roads behind her, occasionally turning to fiddle with the stickshift on the ground at her side.
It was then that Jen realized that the ground she'd been standing on only moments ago was at least a hundred feet below them.
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The House wasn't much more than an ordinary cabin on the outside. Two stories, rather rustic in design, a solitary front door in the center. The front of the building sat aligned with a winding serpant of a cobblestone path, the adjacent two sides, which looked to be certainly two-story in apposition to the flat center, wrapped around the front like the sides of an unfinished square. Jen had finally begun to feel a sense of comfort in this bizarre place as she stumbled from the vehicle, once again safe on the ground. Yet, she couldn't help but feel as if she'd fall through some trap door as she approached the front and, seemingly only, entrance, Conan on her right side and Annelise on her left.
The door was opened and the trio made their way through, Jen trailing behind to pick up the tail. That front door only led to what looked to be an elevator of sorts, without buttons. Rather, a small rectangular panel lay on the opposite wall, displaying what looked to be some sort of button and a vertical container of half-solidified green water. It was Conan who moved first, ahead of the others, his right hand lifting and shoving its way into the movable liquid, which Jen suspected felt something like watered-down Jell-O. That button-type object lit up a neon green, and Conan pulled his hand from the goo, wiping it on its corresponding pantleg as the floor beneath them began to move downward. Fast.
It was only natural that Jen's new companions knew that such movement was to happen; Annelise had sported black legging beneath her aqua skirt, and if Conan had been wearing any sort of skirt or dress to begin with, Jen never would've followed him. Such left the poor gal to fend for her own, attempting to keep her dress down in four places with two hands as the floor, now nothing but a flat platform, pummeled downward for what seemed only a few moments.
That platform came to a halting stop, causing Jen to stumble and fall back to her rear, giving an unpleasant "oomph!" at the impact. The scenery had changed dramatically since the outside, and a sudden sense of insecurity struck her as she stood back to her feet. The place was dark, damp, smelling horribly like gasoline and cigarette smoke. A lethal combination. Save for the thick glass pathway lying before them and the door and solid wall on the other side, there seemed no other sign of material belongings in the room, unless the looming shadows halfway across the room weren't just part of Jen's obviously overactive imagination and did indeed make up some sort of spacecraft.
The only other sign of life was looming about the other side of the room, both hands pressed against that dark wall and a metal bucket on the ground beside. Her head lifted and craned slowly over her shoulder at Jen's outcry, not looking too happy about it either. She was obviously left-handed, for it was with that hand in which she clenched a well-worn rag, scrubbing vigorously at that wall. The silver wedding band around the stranger's left ring finger perplexed Jen more than the strange world around her had; certainly, this woman wasn't much of a looker, and Jen could already tell her personality wasn't much to love either.
"Lose a bet with Dameon?" Conan let the words escape with a laughing tone to his voice, giving Jen a firm pat on the back and pushing her to a teeter onto the glass walkway before her, forcing Annelise to pull up the rear this time around. The newest addition to Jen's seemingly ever-growing "clique" pulled a still-burning cigarette from between her lips with much unnecessary force, tossing that rag to the bucket beside her with a low splash.
"Well, I'm not doing it for fun.." Her head fell foward, black hair falling to her eyes, save for an obvious tear in the left side of her bangs. That cigarette followed in the footsteps of its predecessing rag, falling with a much higher-pitched 'plip' to that metal bucket, which she turned around to lift from the ground.
Jen kept close behind Conan as he began to move across that walkway toward the door on the other side, her hands wrapped tight around his shirt. Who knew? Once they made it to the other side of that wall, perhaps everything would get better. Things only seemed to be growing worse, though, as the newest meet managed to lock eyes with Jen, her facial expression fading to one of pure horror.
"My comrade Hikaru back there... thinks you're some big, evil, supervillan and all that happy crap..."
"My comrade Hikaru back there... "
"My... comrade... Hikaru..."
So this was Dameon's Hikaru. Jen couldn't quite place her finger on what set off the spontaneous remembrance of her one-sided conversation with Dameon way back... there. Truthfully, she'd imagined "Hikaru" to be a lot better looking than she was in person; she was rather bony, ribcage showing over the top of her shirt, surrounded in a cloud of secondhand smoke. Not much to be attracted to. But this had to be her. Just the wide-eyed stare she'd given Jen, alone, proved the thought.
She'd thought Jen was in on some plot of the syndicate's no doubt. And when she turned her attention toward Conan, Jen was certain she'd be out on the streets again.
"You brought back a blonde?!" The angered words startled Jen, her eyelids flying open and shut in a series of rapid blinks. "For Pete's sake, Conan! This is a war, not a-- a-- a beauty pageant!" It was clear she'd wanted to go off on a rant on Jen, blonde hair, women in general, though was silenced by an angry glare from Conan; apparently, he'd heard his share of blonde jokes, and wished to hear none from his own comrade.
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"Now... I don't know why... but something makes you oddly familiar..." As Conan had reassured her, Dameon Lasser had returned long before Jen had gotten her first glimpse of the building. Of course, he'd obtained a rather long slice across his face since last the two had crossed paths, and had seemed to make no effort to stop the like from bleeding. Jen had honestly intended on refreshing his memory, had Annelise not interrupted, moving hurriedly toward Dameon, standin on tiptoes to even accomplish grasping his chin to pull him down to her eye length.
"Dameon... what'd you do to your face?" She didn't seem to hold any pity for the injury, rather, seemed more intent on scolding him for having being injured in the first place.
"You think I'd cut up my own face? It was that Hukuda bastard..."
"Honestly Dameon... couldn't you be more careful?" Her right hand was lifted, index and middle finger pressed against the bridge of his nose, where that gash ended. Her eyes were flickered closed, the tips of her fingers emitting a soft glow, and with a muttered "Tanka harwar", the scar had diminished, a bolt of light shooting up the gash and fading, taken the injury with it. She released his face once again, allowing him to stand to his full height once again.
"Really. Why should I 'be more careful' when you can just do that magic... thingie?" He flopped back to a rather worn couch a few inches behind him, the same one he stood from when Jen had been introduced to him.
"It tires me out, Dameon!" Now she seemed to be getting annoyed, turning her side toward the other man, arms crossed across her chest. "Believe it or not, it takes energy to cast those spells... I have to use them only when it's necessary!"
Jen seemed to drift from the arguement between the two, her mind still a wreck from the incantation she'd only just witnessed.
"You'll get used to it..." It shouldn't have surprised her in the least that the newest voice came from a man hanging by his legs from an air vent... but for some reason, it did. He was rather well tanned, his mop of black hair unruly, the green-tinted goggles not helping it to look any better. He stared down toward Jen from his upside down birdseye view, one hand extending out toward her. "You're a new face... Cyrus Zanner..."
"J-Jennifer Kvalko..." She extended a hand of her own to grasp hold of the one he'd offered her, the unfading feeling that he was going to fall at any moment strong in her mind. No sooner had their hands joined together was his pulled away, offering an upside down 'V for Victory' peace sign and scurrying back into the vent quick as he'd come, like a rat. Apparently, he'd just heard commotion and took it upon himself to investigate.
Conan returned then, clasping one hand to Jen's shoulder, an action which made the latter jump and spin around hurriedly, a hand to her mouth.
"There's someone you should meet..." If he noticed the fright he'd caused her, he certainly didn't seem apologetic, as he reached down for her arm, leading her along out of that room and back down a rather long hallway with walls of glass, giving a perfect view of the freakishly dark outside. They continued in silence, him with a smile wide against his face and her looking deadly confused, just trailing after him like an obediant dog.
They managed to make their way to the end of that hall without any conversing between one another, until they reached that hall's end, nothing but a panel much like the one she'd seen at the opening of the building-- couldn't even <I>call</I> it a house. His hand was shoved into the green liquid much as it had done before, and Jen automatically shifted her hands to push her skirt down, certain that the floor was going to fall again. She never saw Conan look back toward her, though he did give a low chuckle of sorts, like he'd a way of knowing what she'd done.
The wall before them slid to an opening and Jen released her skirt, peering into the recently uncovered room. Just a door. Well... this place certainly couldn't become any more of a maze, now, could it? Conan turned over his shoulder, giving a bit of a low-throated chuckle and lifting one hand in a motion for her to follow him, turning around once again and making his way back through that door. Jen followed uneasily, her hands held to her chest. She wasn't quite sure what she'd expected behind that door, but with all she'd seen so far, she wasn't sure if anything would be surprising anymore.
It wasn't all that surprising. The second door led to a room tinted by red lighting, semi-circular in shape, with a lining of no more than five chairs along a brigade of a panel of buttons, and knobs, and dials along the rounded walls of the room. One of these chairs was occupied: the centermost one, and by a woman from the length of the hair. But... then again... Conan could've easily been mistaken for a woman as well...
The lights dimmed, and lifted once again only a moment later, the red hue gone and showing the true colours of the room. She turned around, the back of her chair brushing up against the side of that panel.
For the first time since coming to this strange world did Jen feel as if she finally found another human being. Her latest encounter didn't look to be a gender she wasn't, and didn't act far too kind to her. She wasn't overly tall or anorexic, didn't chain smoke or hang around in the ceilings, and her skin tone was within the vast range of orange hues. Most importantly, she didn't want to kill Jen. She just offered a smile, a strange whiteness against her sun darkened face, extended one hand out to the girl and spoke: "Hi. I'm Julie Ethans; I run this place."
Even her name was normal. Jen seriously felt the need to stop herself from embracing the other woman, settling for a handshake instead. "Ah... Jennifer Kvalko... it's a real pleasure to meet you... Mrs. Ethans..."
"Call me 'Jei'..." She withdrew her hand again, letting it return to its opposite in their cross across her chest, a rather hearty laugh emitting from her slender throat. "And what makes you think I'm a Mrs.? I'm not married... not yet..." Her deep brown hair fell toward one side as her gaze was shifted toward Conan., one arm unraveling from the other to rest against its corresponding armrest, her chin rested atop her knuckles. His gaze met with hers for a moment before a nervous chuckle emitted from his chest, head dropping to the ground as a light pink tinge spread across his cheeks. "So what's she doin' here, lover?"
So they were a couple. Not exactly the best pairing, really; they seemed too much alike.
Conan regained his state of mind with a forced cough, lifting one balled hand toward his mouth as is gaze lifted from the floor. "She's from Earth! The uninhabited planet! One of Dain's goons was out to kill her... actually, Dameon saved her..."
"Dameon'd save a walking tit if he found one..." Jei stood from her seat, moving forward to Conan's side and placing a gentle hand on his shoulder, whilst her attention was turned to Jen. "Can'tcha fight?"
The question rather startled Jen, her head picking up rather high to look toward her elder as the latter spoke, before lowering again as she gave a negative shake of her head. "Uhn... uh-uhn..."
"Well, can'tcha do anything?!"
The newest aroused question got her to think, her head falling lower as she pondered the matter. That pastry shop from her own time suddenly came to mind, and her head was lifted again, the hint of hope in her eyes. "I can... make various breads and candies?"
Her response must've brought something up, for Jei and Conan turned to one another, eyebrows lifting as identical looks of serious consideration crossed their faces. Jei broke the glance, turning back toward Jen. "Can ya make anything else?"
"I-- uh-- if I put my mind to it... I guess I could..."
Jei's hand was shifted from Conan's shoulder to Jen's as a rather vivid smile crossed her face. "Congrats... you can stay, butcha gotta replace Annelise on kitchen duty." She stood up straight again, her hand moving to rest against its corresponding hip. "We'll take care o' ya the rest of the way."
Jen couldn't contain herself any longer. She flung her arms around her elder's shoulders with a yell of "Thank you!", and Conan even turned to give Jei a genuine smile at her decision.
Of course, happiness can only go on for so long, and this one was over before it even really started. The room rang with a horrendous loud ring, much like a fire alarm, and echoed with the distant sounds of the same satanic tune from the rooms all over the building. The lights faded to a red once again, blinking on and off as an additional warning, for anyone who couldn't hear the alarm sound.
"Wh-what's happening?!" Jen let the words out in a yell as she clasped her hands tight over her ears, her voice barely managing to maneuver its way over the screech of the alarm. Neither Jei nor Conan seemed at all fazed by the sudden happenings, the former of which tilted her head to the ceiling with a slight annoyance.
"They're here..."