Anomaly

Another week went by without anything truly significant happening. No giant asteroid on a collision course with Earth, no colossal anomaly laying waste to an entire continent, no absurdly massive anomalous sea creature forcing ships to reroute, and, thankfully, no insane priest deciding to meddle with forces he clearly didn't understand.

Not even a single noteworthy anomalous location was cataloged during that time. So yeah... it was a surprisingly quiet week. That said, for some reason, the more "normal" things seem, the less "normal" I feel they'll stay.

Maybe it's just paranoia after everything that's happened, but I've learned that whenever the world gets a little too quiet, it's usually because a storm is brewing somewhere on the horizon. Still, I can't really complain. It's been quite a while since the incident involving the priest, and we've been incredibly lucky. Nothing truly serious has happened since then.

A few anomalies have continued to appear here and there, just as expected, but for the most part they've only been relatively simple anomalous objects with predictable properties, quickly identified and contained by the Anomaly Response Teams before they could cause any major problems.

If I had to point out something unusual I'd noticed... it would probably be Charlotte. About three days ago, she started experiencing sharp twinges inside her head. She doesn't exactly describe them as headaches, at least, not in her own words, but rather as a constant feeling of discomfort.

According to Charlotte, it feels like there's a faint buzzing somewhere inside her skull. Emily and Laura focused countless examinations specifically on that, analyzing her brain and every part of her head in search of any abnormality. They found absolutely nothing.

Charlotte's brain, as well as the rest of her cranial structure, appeared completely normal, indistinguishable from that of any perfectly healthy person. That should've been reassuring... I think. The problem is that, despite the complete lack of any visible complications, her symptoms aren't going away.

If anything, they're gradually getting worse. At first, Charlotte could hide the discomfort without much difficulty, but now all it takes is watching her for a few moments to notice whenever another one of those sharp pains strikes.

Whenever it happens, one of her eyes involuntarily squeezes shut, her lips tighten into a pained expression, and for a brief moment her entire face stiffens before the pain subsides. As the episodes became more frequent and more intense, Emily and Laura decided to repeat every test from scratch.

After all, how could we possibly treat something when we didn't even know what was causing it? This time, I decided to go with them. Watching Charlotte endure those episodes over and over again was starting to bother me too, and I wanted to be there in case there was anything I could do to help.

Naturally, Charlotte's parents were there as well. At first, Emily and Laura couldn't decide whether they should tell them about Charlotte's new symptoms. But after the attacks continued for two straight days, they finally gave in. I also convinced them there was no point in hiding it from Charlotte's parents.

Besides being the right thing to do, there was no realistic way we could've kept something like this a secret. They visited her regularly, and it wouldn't have taken them long to realize something was wrong. As expected, the news was met with deep concern.

The two of them bombarded Emily and Laura with questions, desperately searching for any explanation that might put their minds at ease. Unfortunately, none of us had one. The truth was painfully simple. We had absolutely no idea what was happening to Charlotte, much less how to stop whatever was causing her condition to worsen.

"So... you really have no idea what's causing these... headaches my daughter has been having?" Charlotte's father asked, his voice heavy with concern.

As he spoke, he ran a hand through his hair, absentmindedly messing it up, a nervous habit that betrayed his anxiety far more than his words ever could. Beside him, Charlotte's mother wasn't doing much better.

One hand was pressed tightly against her chest, gripping the fabric of her clothes so hard that her knuckles had turned white, while the other rested against the glass separating us from Charlotte, as though she wished she could reach through it and pull her daughter into her arms.

Emily and Laura exchanged a brief glance but remained silent. Neither of them seemed to have an answer capable of comforting them: "So..." Charlotte's father began, only to stop himself.

He swallowed hard, looking toward his daughter for a brief moment before turning back to Emily and Laura. It was obvious he was hesitating to ask his next question, as though simply saying it out loud might somehow make it come true.

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Even so, he took a deep breath and forced himself to continue: "Could... could this be fatal? Is Charlotte in any real danger? I mean... even with these headaches, every test says her body is completely normal, right?" His voice faltered: "Maybe... maybe it isn't as serious as it seems" The last sentence came out barely above a whisper, sounding far more like a desperate attempt to convince himself than an actual question.

Emily let out a long sigh, unable to hide her frustration. Her eyes remained fixed on the monitors tracking Charlotte's condition, studying every graph and every stream of data as though she expected an answer to suddenly reveal itself at any second. The tension on her face made it painfully obvious how frustrated she had become with results that simply refused to make sense.

"Honestly... I can't give you any guarantees" Her voice remained steady, but there was unmistakable hesitation beneath her professional composure. She looked away from the screen for a moment before continuing: "On one hand, every test we've run so far shows that Charlotte is completely healthy. There isn't a single sign of illness, injury, or any physical abnormality"

Emily paused, taking a slow breath before rubbing her temple with two fingers, trying to ease the headache that was beginning to set in: "On the other hand..." she murmured, gently shaking her head: "We can't simply ignore the pain she's been experiencing. It's real. It's constant... and it's clearly not normal"

The silence that followed made the room feel even heavier. Emily turned back toward the monitors before speaking again, this time in a much more serious tone: "And if these headaches are actually connected to the abnormal energy fluctuations Charlotte started emitting around the same time they began... then there's really only one possible explanation"

"Our options are pretty limited..." Laura said quietly, lowering her gaze to the papers in her hands.

She was holding several charts and medical reports containing the results of Charlotte's latest examinations. At first glance, the numbers and graphs looked perfectly ordinary. To Laura, however, they only served to reinforce just how abnormal the situation really was.

She glanced over one of the pages before continuing: "If we go any further than we already have, the tests are going to become far too invasive..." she said with a restrained sigh, shaking her head: "I'd really rather not take things that far. Not while there are still other options, even if none of them are exactly... pleasant"

For a few seconds, silence settled over the room. Laura kept staring at the charts as though she expected to find an answer hidden somewhere among the lines, one that simply wasn't there.

"To be honest... I have no idea what we're supposed to do now" Her voice carried a rare hint of frustration: "I've never dealt with anything like this before. Charlotte appears to be completely human, inside and out. Every test confirms it. The pain she's feeling... definitely isn't being caused by her human body"

Laura slowly lifted her gaze to the others before finishing in a more serious tone: "It's coming from... the other part of her"

As Charlotte's parents processed everything they had just heard, they both swallowed hard. They understood exactly what Laura meant when she referred to "the other part of her" Naturally, she was talking about Selyra, the greatest unknown in this entire situation and, so far, the only variable that no one had any control over.

Charlotte's father remained silent for several seconds before finally finding the courage to speak: "Is she..." The words caught in his throat for a moment. His eyes instinctively turned toward me, as if hoping I had an answer that could ease all of his fear: "Is she hurting Charlotte?"

There was no accusation in his voice, no anger, no resentment. It was simply the honest question of a desperate father trying to understand what was happening to his daughter. My golden eyes, like tiny flickering flames, remained fixed on Charlotte on the other side of the glass.

My body hovered a few inches above the floor, held aloft by the slow, silent beat of the wings that emerged from just above my tailbone. Only after a few moments did I shift my gaze to meet Charlotte's father's eyes.

My answer came calmly, though it carried its own uncertainty: "Not necessarily" My expression remained unreadable, even though deep down I shared the very same concern consuming my little sister's parents: "Even without knowing Selyra's true intentions, there's one thing I'm certain of. We Virtues cannot act against the forces we embody. Doing so would mean violating the very foundations that uphold reality itself... and the consequences would be catastrophic"

I paused briefly, carefully choosing my next words: "That's why I don't believe Selyra is deliberately trying to hurt Charlotte. But... that doesn't mean she couldn't be the source of her pain. It's entirely possible that some kind of process is taking place between the two of them... and that these pains are simply one of its consequences"

My voice echoed softly through the room, breaking the silence that had settled over everyone and drawing their attention to me. Up until that moment, I had remained quiet, listening to every theory, every hypothesis, and every detail Emily and Laura had presented.

But as I listened to everything they said, a conclusion had gradually begun to take shape in my mind. Based on everything we'd learned so far, it seemed highly likely that Selyra was behind all of Charlotte's pain... At the same time, Charlotte was also Selyra.

Just trying to make sense of that thought was enough to tie my brain in knots. In a way, they were two different individuals... yet they were also the very same existence. Trying to separate them completely simply didn't make sense.

Even so, if Selyra truly was the source of all the pain Charlotte had been experiencing, I refused to believe it was intentional. Everything pointed to those pains being nothing more than the side effect of something far greater unfolding behind the scenes.

But that wasn't the real question. A side effect... of what? That was the question that truly mattered. And judging by the heavy silence that filled the room, it was painfully clear that, at that moment, none of us had an answer.

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