Aeon (Chimera 2.5)

I Can't Believe It's Not Getting Better!

November 25, 2057: Sukori, Kirunda, 243

"Jeez, how much stuff is in here?" Shawna picked up yet another cardboard box and set it down outside the closet. "I swear, there's stuff farther back in this closet than I ever was."

Tonja snorted at that, but tried to act like she didn't think it was funny. "Shawna, please," she said. "We're just trying to get this cleaned up."

"What? It's true. I'm surprised I ever managed to come out."

"Chizu, please tell her her jokes aren't funny."

On the other side of the room, Chizu merely shrugged. "Sorry," she said. "I can't control her."

Shawna grinned at Tonja. "See? Even Chizu can't stop this lesbian from cracking gay closet jokes."

Tonja sighed and shook her head. "Just help me sort through this stuff."

Shawna, Tonja, and Chizu were working in the basement to clean it up a little. Apparently, Chizu had been considering getting it remodelled lately, but before she could do that, she needed to clean it first. There were a lot of things lying around in cardboard boxes, so it wasn't going to be an easy task. But as long as she could tell plenty of gay jokes, Shawna was sure it would be fine.

As she and Tonja were going through the closet, though, Shawna came across a box that was smaller than the others. Curious, she opened it and looked inside. "Whoa. Tonja, look at these."

"What is it?" Tonja looked away from the box she was examining and turned to the one Shawna was holding. "Wait. What are those?"

"I dunno. Cool, huh?" Shawna looked across the room. "Hey, Chizu. What are these?"

Chizu walked over to the two of them and took the box. "Oh, these are Amulets," she said, pushing Amulets aside to get a good look at all of them. "Old, busted ones that the Legion broke with all their experiments."

"So these were, like... test Amulets or something?" Tonja said.

"Basically, yes. The Legion has a way to stretch the limits of how much Energy a single Amulet can hold. But in achieving that, there were a lot of failed tests. These Amulets are all remnants of those tests."

Shawna took a good look at the contents of the small box. The Amulets all seemed to be charred black, which was odd since they were all made of metal. They were dull, too, and it was hard to tell where one Amulet ended and another began. They all seemed to blend into each other.

Well, except for one.

"Hey, this one's different." Shawna reached into the box and pulled out the Amulet she'd spotted. It was made of gold, with gemstones of various different colors dangling from the golden chain in various places. There was a small paper tag tied to it. "Uh... 'obtained from D.O.' What's that mean?"

Chizu gasped and set down the box. "Let me see that," she said, and Shawna handed it to her. Chizu was silent for a moment as she examined it. Her eyes widened. "Why... why do we have this?"

There were footsteps headed down the stairs then, and Arias was the one who soon stood at the bottom of the staircase. "Miss Yasui, can I--" He started to say something, but then he noticed the Amulet Chizu was holding... and froze. He literally froze--just stopped moving completely.

"Arias?" Chizu said, turning to him. The boy's eyes were fixed on the Amulet, but he almost seemed... scared of it. "Arias, do you know what this is?"

"I, um... n-no." Arias shook his head, suddenly snapping out of his trance. "No. I don't recognize it."

"You're lying," Tonja said. Shawna had figured as much, but she wasn't going to call the kid out on it so fast. "You do know what it is."