Author's Note

As an original 'A' chapter, this chapter still contains the non-con aspect of the original storyline. Anyone following the Non-Con Removed version will need to move to the next chapter 1B.

Chapter 1A - Search Interrupted (Contains Non-Con)

I stood by the window, peering out through the cracked glass. A few drops of rain still clung to the glass from the storm in the night. I squinted as the sun finally decided to peek through the clouds. My left eye twitched and I rubbed it with the back of my hand. It didn’t help. It never helped. Only money could fix it and here I stood, in the dusty office of a long-abandoned smelting plant, without a cent to my name.

My name? Monochrome. I got it from the combination of my skin and hair. Midnight black skin with scruffy, white hair. It wasn’t the name I was born with. I forgot that name long ago; lost to the years of wandering.

It wasn’t a surprise for me to be in this kind of place. It was the sort of building I gravitated toward, especially when I had just arrived in a new town. It was a starting point. A place to centre myself, to scavenge parts to make whatever I could to earn some money. More importantly, it was cheap. That is to say, there was no rent. All so very normal for me. Usually, it wouldn’t concern me. I would be the only mouth to feed and I’d go hungry if needed. But, now, I wasn’t alone. She was here.

I wasn’t looking to be anyone’s hero. I was just investigating something which felt off about the world. Something which felt familiar, even homely. I guess that was what drew me to the girl. She had a, I don’t know, kind of aura about her. I can’t easily explain it. I wish I could. Especially why it felt broken, like a shattered pane of glass. I turned away from the window to find her still sitting where she had since yesterday evening.

She stared across the room with nothing but a graffiti-covered wall to meet her unfocussed gaze. She had interesting hair, I’ll give her that. Purple and mint streaks. Half her hair was roughly held up in what had been a pair of twin tails. The rest of it was mussed with errant strands sticking out all over. Her clothes, similar in colour to her hair, with a little cream thrown in, were dishevelled and torn. How much was from what she had been through or simply the style she favoured was difficult to tell.

Her name… I think she mumbled the word Aria at some point. Even if it wasn’t her name, it at least gave me something to call her by. She was quiet, still very much lost in thought. Not surprising, considering how I had encountered her.

I snarled at the memories then shook my head, attempting to force the thoughts aside. That was then. Now was something else. Oddly, with the events of three days ago, Aria had not wanted to go to hospital, nor the police.

The latter didn’t surprise me. Like me, she preferred to be unnoticed by authority. The former, however… All things considered, I still felt like ignoring her refusal. I doubted she was physically all right, especially with her mental state, but it was hard to get her headed anywhere she was adamantly against visiting.

Her only request, not food, nor water. Not even money. It seemed so simple. Find her sisters.

That’s what we’d be doing today, now the rain had stopped.

* * *

“You sure about this?” I asked.

Aria gave a short nod and mumbled just one word. “Yes.”

“Okay.” I was puzzled. Of all the places she could think of, the one where she believed she might find her sisters was right in front of us. I blinked and raised an eyebrow. It was a school. A high school by the sign.

I don’t know why I was surprised. Aria wasn’t exactly an adult in appearance. Nor was I for that matter. Considering I wasn’t very tall I could pass for someone a fraction of my age.

The school itself wasn’t anything unusual to look at. In fact, it could’ve passed for being a school in any part of the state, let alone country. It had taken us a while to walk here so it wasn’t much of a shock to find the day had already started. I heard some cheering in the background and shrugged. It sounded louder than for a normal gym class. Maybe some sports carnival?

I shook my head and made my way up the steps to the front doors. Taking one of the handles, I tried to pull it open. No movement. I gave it a push instead. The door didn’t budge. I heard another cheer go up. With the door refusing to open, I grumbled to myself before turning to face Aria. She was in the last stages of fixing her second twin tail.

I gave a thin smile. At least she wouldn’t look completely like she’d had a run-in with a bear in a dumpster. And, I instantly regretted the thought. It wasn’t her fault how she currently looked. That honour belonged to a man probably trying to lay low from police at the moment. There was another cheer.

“Isn’t this a school day?” I asked.

Aria shrugged. “Think so.”

Wow. Two words together. We were improving.

With her appearance slightly improved, Aria began to look around. Her attention suddenly snapped to the direction of the cheering.

I stepped down to stand beside her. “Any idea where your sisters could be?”

When she didn’t respond, I called her name and looked at her. Her face was scrunched up with concern. The moment I looked in the direction she was staring I knew the reason. At least I could feel the reason. It was like a breeze washing over me. No, not just over my body, through it. Like rippling waves caressing me both inside and out. Yet, there was no wind. Neither our clothes nor hair were fluttering.

The ripples grew rapidly in intensity and frequency, striking through me over and over again. It vaguely reminded me of the feeling which drew me to find Aria in the first place, only this was much more intense. I swear I could taste it. I glanced at Aria. The look of concern on her face told me she felt it as well.

Then the ripples slammed into us. I staggered back from the hit. When I regathered myself, I was greeted with an intense lightshow in the sky. Out of the lightshow, emerged a… Okay, I know I haven’t had anything to eat since lunch yesterday, but did hallucinations of winged, purple female demons count as a symptom of hunger?

Looking to Aria again, I found her glaring at the demon. She then dashed forwards, running toward the demon and the area surrounding it. I shouted at her to stay but she kept going. I gave chase but lost sight of Aria around the end of a set of wooden bleachers. I heard screams and shouts erupting from the stands and felt several pulses of energy, similar to the earlier ripples as they burst around the area.

More screams erupted. I caught sight of Aria. She had stopped dead in her tracks, staring at something in front of her. The ground just beyond her feet was an oddly different colour to the rest of the running track she stood on. People were running everywhere. As I drew near, I could see the demon closer now, her mouth cracked in a nasty sneer. I reached out to grab Aria’s arm. There was another flash of light. I snatched my arm back to shield my eyes but forgot to stop running.

I crashed into the back of someone. Probably Aria. She was the only one in front of me at the time. I opened my mouth to apologise but couldn’t even hear myself as we tumbled toward the ground. I closed my eyes and prepared for impact, one that didn’t immediately happen. We just kept falling, a tangle of limbs. Wherever the ground was, we had to have passed it by now.

Falling. Falling. I could feel the wind pulling at my scruffy hair, even against the rest of my body, as we continued to tumble. The wind was so cold, I swear it was somehow passing straight through my clothes and licking at every inch of my skin. My body flipped over, forcing my face into the wind. Wow! It stung like a million needles. My eyes were watering and I couldn’t even open them to see what was happening. I felt my lungs begin to burn and realised I was gasping for a breath I couldn’t catch.

My mind started to drift. I could still feel the wind, but not the pain. It was like I was drifting off to sleep in a wind tunnel. Whatever was going to happen, I hoped it would be soon as my thoughts began to ease. Before I could black out, I had one last sense pass through my brain. Where was that ground?

Just as I lost all vision, I glimpsed an intense flash of pale blue light. Then… nothing.