Sarah was dragged from sleep as what she assumed to be a freight train pulled up outside her room. In a panicked scramble she tried to get out of bed, got tangled in the sheets and fell to the hard floor with a thump. What the hell was that? She thought as she recovered and forced her mind to start working. She checked the small clock on her desk to find it was 04:55. Maybe magic alarm clocks were a lot louder than the mundane variety.
Still with groggy steps she retrieved the black uniform she had been given and changed into them. She wished she had time for a morning shower but knowing the militaristic style of her “program” she couldn’t waste time. She quickly got changed and made her way out of her room and down to the first floor. She looked around and found no one she checked outside. After opening the front door, she found four people lined up in front of a tall woman and Logan. She jogged over to the end of the line and stood like the others with feet shoulder width apart and hands clasped behind their back. She did her best with her only mostly conscious brain to copy the others.
After she lined up and was introduced to the other cadets her beast was feeling at those around her. She wasn’t sure how it was able to feel such things but was too tired to question it. Her beast recognized Frederic and Wyn but took a closer look at the other two. The man had a feeling similar to herself and Logan but was more…reptilian? The final woman felt like Frederic but somehow opposite. She assumed that meant she was some sort of demon. She was already nervous at having to work with a weird being like Wyn, but now she had to live with a literal demon.
She did her best to suppress a yawn as she thought about the night before. When she left her room to see if there was anything in the fridge. Instead of having to scrounge for food there was a burger and fries waiting for her with a little note with her name on it. It did take her a little courage to eat the magically appearing meal. Her hesitation only worsened when she realized she was actually craving a burger. Only once her beast and empty stomach demanded food she was able to dig in. It had to have been the best burger of her life. She imagined it was like those $100 Vegas burgers with the excessive ingredients and gold leaf.
She didn’t know if it was a good or bad thing that as soon as she had eaten her fill she immediately fell into a food coma. On one hand she wasn’t able to meet her house-mates and somehow accidentally insult them. On the other hand, the first impression she did have was one of her stumbling out and looking like an idiot. There’s nothing to remind her of the first days of anything like bad first impressions.
She was almost lost in her thoughts when the woman she could only describe as an amazon told Sarah to follow her for processing. Even though she knew that was going to at least be the start of her day, the term “processing” wasn’t exactly giving her courage.
After the two of them were about half way there the woman finally filled the silence. “The first step will be a basic orientation on the being world. After that, you will need to sign some paperwork, get your magic signature collected, go through a mental evaluation, and get your translation mark. Someone will be there to guide you through the whole thing. If anything goes wrong, I’ll be nearby doing my own work.”
Sarah was tempted to ask some questions, but the presence and aura of the woman made her beast warn her they were an apex predator and should be left alone. The feeling her beast got was reptilian like the man from earlier while also having more magic to her. It was guaranteed that she was cursed but both her and her tiger were stumped on what beast it could be. The stoic and straight-backed woman then drove in silence.
Sarah was eventually able to gather the courage to speak. She hadn’t felt that meek since she obtained her tiger. The seemingly accidental suppression was similar to when Logan used his beast to force her to shift back. “I don’t think I got your name,” she said while trying to sound confident.
“My name is Instructor Amara Liakos” she said without taking her eyes off the road. “I am in charge of the Hunter-Class training program. You will call me Instructor, Instructor Liakos or ma’am. Understood?”
“Yes ma’am,” Sarah said instinctively.
“My job is to take you from the weak,” she scanned her top to bottom, “scholar of some sort to someone that can actually win a fight.” Sarah was able to keep her beast down when it got offended at the insinuation.
“Any and all questions will be answered by whoever is helping you at the time.” She said cutting off Sarah’s question. Her blunt tone changed to annoyance, “until you can prove that you won’t be a drag to my program you mean nothing. I don’t care if the Council assigned you to me. If I deem you incompetent or unsalvageable you will be removed, and I don’t give a damn who gave you to me or where you are reassigned. Understood?”
Sarah swallowed past the lump in her throat and nodded. “Yes ma’am.”
Instructor Liakos remained silent for the rest of the trip and Sarah didn’t want to risk breaking it.
They eventually reached the temple and entered through the front archway. The closer she got the more her internal archaeologist started geeking out. The combination of so many architectural styles of people who should never have been in contact was astounding. The tiered roof style of Hindu temples was supported with the tall columns of Greek and Roman structures. The intricate sculptures across the walls were reminiscent of Egyptian pictographs while also depicting moments from Buddhist mythology.
She hadn’t realized she had stopped until the instructor briskly called out to her. She hastily caught up and followed her into the building. The abstract combination of modern and ancient was causing her mind to short-circuit. Next to the impossibly detailed sculptures of gods and beings was a modern receptionist’s desk with what looked like an elf typing away at a computer. She once again stopped and stared.
“Don’t be rude,” Instructor Liakos admonished.
“Uh, Sorry.” Sarah said while following the still-moving woman.
They walked through a few additional corridors while passing creatures she could never have imagined being real. One was a tiny man in a business suit that flew around on butterfly wings while another looked to be a woman made entirely of flames who floated by while working on a tablet. Sure someone that looked like they were on fire didn’t give off heat and could handle tech without damaging it. She had to stop from staring again as she caught up to the instructor until they reached a door with a label in a language she didn’t recognize.
As they entered Sarah took in the interior. It was a moderately sized room with long tables and chairs pushed under them. The front wall was dominated by a large extending screen set up in the direction of a projector on the ceiling.
“Take a seat and I’ll start the presentation.” Instructor Liakos said picking up a remote and turning on the projector. “When it’s over, go across the hall and talk to the one there.”
As she sat, Sarah watched the woman, after fiddling with the remote for a few seconds along with curses under her breath in another language, she selected a video. As soon as it started, she placed the remote on a table and left, closing the door behind her.
What played was a voiced over slide show of everything she had already learned from her reading. Magic was real, beings were a thing, they came from human imagination, so on and so forth. Sure, some of the pictures they chose were interesting but not much else. It wasn’t long before her mind started to wander instead of paying attention.
She thought she was getting better at accepting her situation until seeing all the different species just nonchalantly working. She could logic out how an angel or demon could live. They both looked like flesh and blood with only a few additional limbs. Maybe some altered mental connections to connect to the extra information. The cyclops was just a larger human with only one eye. But some of the others were just impossible.
A woman made of fire, a walking plant, and an honest to god ghost. There was no way she could connect their existence with anything from her old world. As she was still mulling over the new sights the video ended.
It was only a few steps to cross the hall to another door with another sign in the mysterious language. After entering she found it to be a large, mostly empty, space with only a circle filled with weird symbols carved into the floor and a bored man sitting at a wide desk facing the wall. The room, like the rest of the temple, was lit by the same light orbs she saw at the barracks.
He didn’t notice her entry and just continued to type away. She waited a little while for him to notice her. When a good ten seconds went by she went over to him and tapped him on the shoulder. When she did he jumped a good few inches in his seat and spun to face her.
Sarah stepped back as he clenched his chest and said something to her. The language he spoke sounded latin based but she couldn’t exactly place it. The man at least looked completely human, and boring at that. He was as if every setting was tuned to average on a character creator. One of those people you meet them multiple times but still can’t remember them.
“Sorry,” Sarah said, “uh, do you speak English?”
He paused for a moment as he did the mental language shift. “I’m guessing you’re the new one I’m scanning today?”
“I think so. Is this where I sign something and my magic gets collected?”
He gave her a smile. “Yup, you’re in the right place.”
“So, you’re the new girl huh?” he said returning to his computer. “I only heard there was a new beast-cursed a few minutes ago. They must really be having you hit the ground running.”
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“Yeah, I think I’m ranked in the top five in the ‘welcome to magic’ surprises."
He laughed, “you’d be surprised. If you ask around, you’ll find some crazy first contact stories. My favorite is when a woman had an adult griffin crash into her farmhouse. Imagine it. You were sitting there reading a book when suddenly a furred and feathered creature the size of a Clydesdale with a tendency to peck anything that gets too close, comes crashing through a wall. Thankfully she was a veterinarian, lived away from people and let’s just say she owned a lot of crystals. She patched up the thing and was hired by some of the beast tamers as a vet.”
Sarah frowned, “how many humans are hired by them, I mean us?”
“More than you think. Though, a lot of elements gotta line up for one to be even considered for it. They have to not be attached to humanity as a whole, be very open minded, adaptable and can do something we have shortage in.” He printed a few pages from a printer under the table and put them on the open space next to him.
“Sign these please. They are standard NDA forms along with statements saying you won’t betray the Keepers organization and will follow assignments to the best of your ability. In exchange we will supply you with room, board, support, and other resources. Penalties vary based on how much there is a breach of contract on either side.”
Sarah walked to the desk and picked up the still-warm sheets. She had signed NDAs and statements before and found the number of pages to be surprisingly light. She was used to them being as thick as possible. The wording was also very clear. She was expecting to have to decode the legalese into something recognizable, but not here. It seemed to be designed to be readable by anyone.
She didn’t find anything in her perusal so she signed them with a pen the man handed her.
“Alright,” she said, checking the signatures and putting the papers aside. “That’s done, stand in the middle of the circle please.” he pointed to the circle carved into the floor. She couldn’t help but take a closer look at it before stepping inside.
“Back to the human subject,” he said while doing something on the computer, "while there are plenty of humans that meet the public criteria I mentioned, they often fail when they have some…problematic interests.”
She paused her inspection of the circle and stepped inside. “Problematic interests?”
“Oh yeah,” he emphasized. “If you want to blame anyone, blame the internet. You ever hear of furries or something called teratophilia? People are weird. You’ll feel strange for a few seconds.” As he said this, multiple circular symbols glowed blue on the ground around her.
She wanted to follow up on his preferences statement but stopped when she felt a weird tingling sensation starting from her head and ending at her feet. It was like each part of her body fell asleep for a moment. At the invasive feeling her beast started getting nervous.
“What was that?” she asked while trying to calm the animal.
“Just getting your mana signature.” He moved on like that didn’t mean anything. As she was about to ask, he continued. “Now I’ll need you to shift to your hybrid form.”
She instantly froze. “What?”
“Your hybrid form. A beast-cursed’s mana signature changes with the shift. So, if you would.”
She shook her head, her heart rate increasing. “No way. I don’t have control over it.” She looked at the regular human imagining her claws tearing him apart. The only reason she was willing to shift on the plane was because she knew Logan and Miyuki were there to stop her.
She shook her head to get the image of flying blood out of her mind. She looked into his nonchalant eyes with fear. “Please don’t make me.”
He gave her a kind smile that calmed her a bit. “Don’t worry, everything’s going to be fine. You’re not the first one I’ve had with that problem. Trust me when I say that I’ll be perfectly safe.”
Something about how he spoke or how he presented himself made her want to believe him. With a shaking breath and a racing heart, she closed her eyes and invited her tiger forward. Because of its already unsettled state it leapt for control. With a grunt Sarah began shifting. Her previous fear returned as she was dropped back into the pit and became an observer.
After shifting, the beast growled at the man with bared teeth. She felt herself crouch and prepare to pounce. She wanted to close her eyes or stop the murderous beast but couldn’t. All of the practice she had on the plane was meaningless. She did her best to scale the pit’s walls but couldn’t get more than a few feet off the ground. As she began mentally screaming for help, her beast-controlled body was about to unleash violence. As her muscles flexed, she dropped to the ground in pain. Her tiger yowled as the loudest high-pitched whistle she ever heard assaulted her.
As she was curled up on the floor she once again felt the weird scanning feeling. The sensation was easily drowned out by the scream that made it feel like daggers were being stabbed through her head. The pain reached the point that the beast began to retreat. Using that opportunity, Sarah pulled herself forward and pushed down on her tiger. She was eventually able to replace its influence and for the first time shift back under her own power. Immediately after she shifted back the tone stopped. She looked up and found the man sitting nonchalant.
“See,” he said, “I’m perfectly fine.”
She struggled to her hands and knees. “What the hell was that?!” she yelled, her ears still ringing from the assault.
He shrugged, “A spell that creates a supersonic tone. Essentially a magic dog whistle.”
“I can’t say it isn’t effective,” she said while standing and holding her aching head. As she recovered, she realized what he said. “Wait, how did you use a spell? I thought you were human.”
The man smiled and as she watched his irises went through a kaleidoscope of colors and his pupils changed into all sorts of shapes before returning to their original brown. “Who said that?”
At that point she wasn’t even surprised. She suspected he wasn’t human even though he didn’t look or feel like a being. Her chest clenched at the disappointment. For a brief moment she was hoping there was someone who she could relate to. Even though she knew logically that she was no longer “human,” she still felt like one. He seemed to notice her shift.
“Listen,” he said in a kind tone, “I know all of this is hard.” Using a nearby box of business cards he pulled one out and held it out for her. She walked over and took the note.
Dr. Cora Rigas PhD – Being Mental Health Specialist: room 225.
“She’s the resident Psychologist. She’s actually your next stop. Some newbies have found her off-putting, but she’s the nicest person you’ll ever meet. After your evaluation you can set up regular sessions for as long as you need. The mental health of our members has always been important. ”
Sarah's hands shook as she began to mentally collapse. The roller-coaster of emotions she had been riding over the last few days had finally hit her. Waking up in a panic, intimidated by her “instructor,” amazed by the building, feeling a massive amount of fear of hurting someone and then her hope of connecting with another human being crushed. Somehow, them talking about how important her mental health was broke her. As tears began to form her already upset beast saw her weakness and jumped.
She fell to her knees and clenched at her chest as she tried to suppress the monstrous animal. It clawed and thrashed in a rage making her chest feel as if it was being torn apart from the inside. Her awareness narrowed as all her focus and panic went to suppression. She pushed the best she could against it in a losing battle. As her body began to shift, she felt a wave of calm like a cool comforting blanket fall across her.
The raging beast immediately began to slow as if growing sleepy. Its struggles weakened and her pain lessened. In less than a minute she had gone from painful panic to total calm. It was the same feeling as first falling into bed after a hard day of work. Like the first dip in a cool pool on a hot day. As she felt like she was beginning to fall asleep it stopped. She blinked a few times as her mind settled.
She looked around her and saw a man at the computer, Instructor Liakos, and a new woman. The woman had light blue skin, darker blue lips, green-turquoise hair, a button nose, and smooth features. She was wearing a very neat tan vest with a matching pencil skirt. What really showed she was a being was that she had a prominent bony ridge from the bridge of her nose to her hair line, pure black eyes, slits that could be gills down the sides of her neck, and numerous pointy teeth shown through her kind smile.
“Hello there,” she said melodically. It was as if she was in a musical and was ready to burst into song. “I’m assuming you’re my next appointment?”
As Sarah was regaining her senses, Instructor Liakos answered for her. “That’s right Dr. Rigas. This is Sarah.”
By that time Sarah had stabilized herself enough to do anything the new woman had already taken her hand and shook it. It was cold, clammy, yet somehow comforting. “Hello Sarah. I am the resident psychologist Dr. Rigas. When I was informed that I was doing an evaluation for a new cursed today I didn’t think we’d be meeting like this.”
“Uh, yeah,” Sarah said dumbly.
The woman gently used the hand to help Sarah to her feet. “Now, please follow me,” she said, still not letting go and guiding her out.
Something about her calmed Sarah. As she obediently followed the woman, she slowly regained her reasoning. By the time they reached a door with the doctor’s placard she was almost back to her usual state, nervous and stressed. As the woman opened the door Sarah once again felt the tingling from earlier. She began to panic until her beast didn’t respond at all to the probe.
Unlike the bare stone or carvings lining the rest of the building’s walls the large office was lined with packed bookcases. The room’s only furniture was two leather chairs facing each other with a wooden coffee table between them. The woman slowed down for a moment also seeming to take in the room before guiding her in and toward one of the chairs.
The musty smell was comforting to her. She related it to better times. The memories of hundreds of hours she spent in libraries researching or combing old bookstores for rare gems re-emerged. The strongest memory was of her parent’s office lined with shelf after shelf of reference material and their personal favorites. It was a time when her biggest worry was passing the next class, not trying to survive whatever bullshit was coming for her next. Her nerves lessened with the nostalgic surrounding.
The doctor sat in one of the chairs and motioned for the other. “Please sit,” she said while retrieving a small handbook and pen from her jacket’s inner pocket. Sarah nodded and silently sat in the surprisingly comfortable chair. It had the perfect amount of cushion while still giving the feeling of real leather.
“I know you’re nervous,” the doctor said, “who wouldn’t be in your situation? Today I just want to talk to you. No digging, no tests, just getting to know each other.”
Sarah wasn’t sure what to think of that. Wasn’t she there to be tested? To see if she was a danger or something?
The siren smiled and continued. “I really mean it. Just talk to me. Don’t think of me as some examiner. Think of me as someone who just wants to help, because I do.” She pointed to the now closed door. “Anyone who walks through that door is my patient, and I consider that sacred. This is a room of complete confidentiality. Everything you say here will stay here. Even if one of the Council ordered information I would, and have, refused to give it. The only time I will say anything is that if I am legitimately concerned you are in imminent danger to yourself or someone else. Are you okay with that?”
Sarah nodded. “I think so.”
The doctor smiled showing her needle-like teeth again. “That’s great. Now let’s begin.”
