Rising Shards

Tik sighed as she waved a projection of a memory away.

"Apologies for another fruitless session," Tik said.

It seemed we hadn't found a good avenue for what Tik wanted to see next from the memories of herself, River, and my parents. We had been stuck on my parents boating away after their exile and wandering around a desolate landscape after, but they weren't even talking much, so it didn't give us much to go off of other than easing my anxiety just seeing them sliver by sliver.

Kalei stretched in her chair, looking towards Kara and Mars, who were unpacking various ghoulish decorations for the classroom set up as our base for this mission.

"So, question," She said. "You guys are like really into the spooky stuff, huh? Like East Valataran's all about this kind of thing, yeah?"

"Well, the city we're from is definitely that vibe," Kara said. "And Lil' East Valataran, based off of said city, is also very deliciously dark and gothic."

"Part of why it's home to us," Mars said.

"Is like...haunted?" Kalei asked.

"Oh, yeah," Mars said. "Super haunted."

"I don't know if I like where this is going," I said.

"Today's jacket actually repels evil spirits," Mars said, twirling to show off his jacket, a puffy dark purple number that had patches of skeletons sewed into it. "It helped us out of a real jam, so it's a top tier one in my line up."

"Ugh, not this story," Kara said.

"Y-yeah, maybe not this story?" I suggested.

"I'm kinda curious now, admittedly," Oka said. "Sorry, boo."

"It's alright..." I said. "Er, maybe Lillia has an objection? Then it'd be a tie, and we'd need a tiebreaker to vote if we're gonna tell the scary story or not!"

Lillia was paging through her planner, and didn't react much to my plea.

"Come on Zates, don't be a baby," Kalei said. "Lillia probably wants to hear it just as bad as we do."

"I'm fairly curious," Lillia said. "Hearing about the paranormal from true experts can be a valuable experience. And the trio seems to be well versed in many fields, so I trust their judgment on this."

"Dang," I said.

"That's three to one, so tell us that story, Mars," Kalei said.

"How come Tik and I don't get to vote?" Kara asked. "I vote with Zeta, this story sucks."

"Says the one who wrote the story for that weak carousel display," Mars said.

"Wow, I put a lot of love into that!" Kara said.

"Let's just tell this tale and bicker later," Tik said.

If Stella joined us for this session, she...probably would have voted with the others. Mars stretched, approaching the front of the classroom as Tik sat down by me.

"We were hired to investigate two deaths," Mars said. "They died at almost the exact same time, dead center of this mansion. The owner feared it was now haunted. And she was right. It didn't take Tik long to figure out what happened to them, they both stabbed each other at the same time."

Every time Mars took a step I braced myself for a big scare, especially when he inched toward the light switches. He acted like he was going to shut them off, but stopped.

"Tik also figured out they planned the whole thing together, and the why was more interesting than the actual killings. These two had an agreement with the owner to haunt the place as ghosts to turn it into a big attraction."

"How would you even plan for that?" Oka asked.

"They were confident enough to do some murdering about it," Mars said.

"That's...really grim," I said.

"Most certainly," Mars said. "The funny thing is, it totally worked. We ran into those ghosts, and they tried scaring us to death for getting in their way. They chased us all around, and just when hope was lost, we lucked into a basement closet where this lovely jacket was, and it saved the day. How, you ask?"

Mars turned around, and I barely processed that a translucent skeleton stepped out of it, flying right for us. By the time I was done screaming, it was long gone.

"In addition to warding off evil spirits, the jacket can also do that," Mars said.

"W-what even was that? Jackets can do that?" I asked.

"Just a little projection," Mars said.

"So stupid," Kara said. "If we're running from ghosts, and your evil jacket spirit wards them off by shooting out a skeleton ghost, then why'd it pop out now? It's just a dumb jumpscare to end your dumb story."

"You're just saying that because you were the most scared of the three of us that night," Mars smirked. "And who knows? Maybe there are evil spirits about..."

I shivered, reaching for my incredibly poofed up tail to comfort me thinking about evil ghosts being nearby. Oka was similarly poofed up, but Kalei and Lillia didn't seem too startled.

"Was any of that story real?" Kalei asked, specifically looking at Tik instead of Mars or Kara.

"I'll let you decide," Tik said.

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