Charlotte Chretien is a high school failure with a long-broken family. Now she's learned her world isn't 'real', it's one of many worlds under threat, and her enemies include the greatest figures of the past. However, she may be able to use said enemies' weapons against them...
Victory was at hand. Another parry, another thrust, and her opponent would be done for. It'd be a close victory, but that just meant people would only talk about it more.
A hushed silence, the stares of the crowd, the glare of the lights, her and her fencer foe positioning themselves almost like a dance, and then…
"Touché!" her foe stated simply.
Everyone cheering her opponent, it felt like the world just broke. 'How could I, how could I lose…'
"Charlotte, are you paying attention?"
That day in the classroom, the orange afternoon glow already streaming in, the brunette schoolgirl Charlotte Chretien was snapped back to the present again. It wouldn't have been the first time her friend, well, 'friend' Olivia had had to do that.
"Alright, sheesh," Charlotte said, then looked at all the notes on the desk. "Hey, any reason we can't just do all this homework at a café, or at your place?" Or Hell, even at my place?
"Oh no, I'm not giving you any chance to just distract yourself," Olivia said, "I mean, you've got college next year or so, I can't have a classmate leave school with failing grades." She almost slammed her hands down on Charlotte's desk there.
Charlotte sighed and leaned back, even moving to put her legs up on her desk. "Seriously Olivia, why do you even care? Like, just focus on your own grades if you're so obsessed with college," she said, then muttered, "Not like your career prospects are that good anyway, Miss Theatre Director."
Olivia, straining not to fume, stepped over and pulled Charlotte on her chair right back down. "Well, you're right in one way, I shouldn't need to have to whip you back into shape like this. Charlotte, what happened to you?" Olivia then asked, her gaze softening, "You used to be top of the class, before... well something or other happened, I don't know."
Charlotte twitched, then had to say, "Hey, whatever 'happened' to me is my own business."
Her eyes narrowed, Olivia asked, "You're still mad about your fencing loss, aren't you?"
"What, that?" Charlotte sighed, then shrugged, "Yeah, guess I am. Like, being good at fencing was the whole reason this school even cared about me."
Olivia sighed back, "Charlotte, honestly, you know that's not true."
That only caused a wicked smirk to cover Charlotte's face. "Really, got any proof of that? Like, how many kids my age have I even talked to lately. Well, besides you, but we're speaking only 'cause I'd make the class look bad or whatever."
"I can't believe you!" Olivia did fume this time, before she pointed to the door, "Alright, y'know, fine! Head straight home if you're just gonna act that way."
Charlotte cocked her head for a second, this sounded to her more than a little like reverse psychology. Still keeping one eye on Olivia, she said, "Alright, fine," and began to walk towards the classroom door. But when she saw Olivia wasn't budging or revealing her bluff, Charlotte then stopped, not sure how to respond. Eventually, she just ran off.
F-Fine, be that way. Friggin' Olivia, like I care about grades or- or college! Charlotte, heading off, was tempted to shout back, but could only muster silence. Not that her thoughts ceased. What would you know? Some of us just don't have a future…
Not that Charlotte wanted to go home, but of course, where else was there? There had been times when she'd thought of running away, a few years ago she'd even gotten a knapsack ready and nearly left through her window, but naturally she choked at the last minute.
Well, Etoile de Sant Michel was a pleasant enough town, at least. If you like 'pleasant', Charlotte thought. It was basically one big hill on this side of the river, occupied by mainly grey stone buildings and faded white houses decorated with wooden X marks and thatched roofs. A tourist could call it quaint or scenic, but it wasn't like the town had had many of those lately.
Charlotte's house, or Honoré's house as it more often felt like, was one of the few modern buildings in town. Modern-ish. It was a brown-bricked house with a dark red roof, windows painted white, and perhaps most notably built on an incline, as the hill sloped down to the riverbed. One flood and we'd be finished, Charlotte thought not for the first time.
"Hey, I'm home!" she shouted as she knocked, a minute or so later she wondered why she even bothered. The door creaked open, with Charlotte tempted for a second to swing it right into the wall to see if her father Honoré would react, only to remember she tried and failed back when she was twelve or something.
The green-walled, wood-panelled interior was standard for houses in this end of France. Well, Charlotte assumed, as the only other house she got invited to these days was Olivia's for cramming. The regularly dusted bookshelves would probably be the most distinguishing feature here, with most of their contents her father's. Reading was yet another thing Charlotte 'used to do more of', nowadays she did so only maybe when she had a book report due. Or whenever Olivia drags me into some production of hers.
There were two places Honoré was likely to be, cloistered in his study or at 'work'. That was the description, or lack thereof, he'd given Charlotte, though she was able to surmise that whatever he did involved some sort of research position. Meh, if his job means I have less to do with him, like I care what it is, she told herself.
She headed up to the attic, a portion of which had been allocated as her bedroom. She instinctively dropped her schoolbag right down on the floor, only for it to risk breaking and falling it through the floorboards. Charlotte flinched but relaxed herself on seeing her ceiling-floor had remain intact. For now.
Charlotte's side of the attic, closed off by a hoisted-up curtain, was mostly a mess of scattered papers and computer equipment, which still didn't improve said computer's performance. A cupboard and unmade bed rounded off the basics, which left most prized possessions. First was a series of fencing trophies… the most recent already quite a while ago. They weren't the only trophies she'd won, she'd gotten quite a few for multiple subjects… all the way back in primary school. The second was what at first looked like just a school photo, but upon sliding it out of its frame, the real treasure close to Charlotte's heart was revealed.
This hidden photo showed her five-year-old self standing and smiling next to a boy her age, a Victorian-dressed brunette woman with hair more lustrous than hers ever got, and well, Honoré, or rather his younger self. Still hadn't stopped Charlotte from smearing liquid paper over her father's picture.
Oh, the woman and the boy were still alive, well last she'd heard anyway, having seen neither since the divorce. She couldn't help but think of what her mother could be doing now, even if Charlotte felt she honestly had no reason to care. Dear old Mum left me to Honoré, shows how much she cared about me, she thought. Her brother Etienne was the same age as her, so she knew he logically couldn't bear any of the blame… but that didn't stop her from thinking: Why did she pick you? How come you were lucky enough to not get stuck with Honoré?
Charlotte hid her family photo again. Not because she'd heard her father coming, a father who was in no mood for any reminder of his divorce, the house was as silent as ever. No, because she couldn't stand to look at it anymore, the photo whose whole point was supposed to remind her of better times had now only left her scowling. Thoughts that were meant to be happy just devolved to spite.
Charlotte then noticed all the homework she had, not helping her mood. Olivia of course came to mind again, Olivia who had never been through a parental divorce, who'd never had a winning streak so utterly broken in front of her whole school. But then Charlotte's stance shifted. Guess I should give Olivia a break? Yeah, she's a nag and a teacher's pet, but… who else ever talks to me on a regular basis? Even if I'm more of a 'project' to her, really. Maybe, ugh, maybe I should apologise for earlier. Or not, she's gonna butt in again soon enough, so what'd be the point?
A sudden creak from below, louder than usual, jolted Charlotte out of her back-and-forth thoughts. She thought to go downstairs to investigate, but then she doubted it'd turn out to be anything, likely just the house acting up again. Not that going downstairs wasn't a good idea, it was about time to be scrounging herself together some dinner.
In fact, turned out it was something, as upon heading downstairs Charlotte twitched as she noticed two bookcases had been pushed apart, leaving a small gap between them. Had Honoré been about to rearrange the room before deciding not to bother?
The gap was narrow enough that Charlotte couldn't tell if she'd be able to squeeze herself in, but taking a deep breath, she only just managed to sidle on through. She winced as her sides chafed, but that discomfort was immediately overtaken by shock when she saw what lay behind the bookcases. A staircase that plummeted downwards, its steps thin and transparent like they were made of an alien's conception of glass. Two eerie green lines that strobed along either side of the corridor gave the only light.
I've-I've gotta be seeing things! The basement's too damp and marshy for anything like this to be built in it, Charlotte thought, breaking out into a cold sweat and having to pinch herself more than once. Yet with this strange, futuristic staircase only reaffirming itself as real, Charlotte then looked back, thinking that turning around would stop any trouble before it could start. And then thought otherwise. Yeah, as if! Honoré's already keeps way too much from me, so whatever the hell he's got under the house, I have the right to know by now!
A single step was all it took for Charlotte to run into her first problem, the echoing sound her school shoes made on the unknown floor. Wait, does glass echo? If 'glass' is what this even is? Fine, I'll adjust, she thought as she took off and picked up her shoes, which due to their laces took longer than she'd like. Her socks being quieter, she was able to reach the bottom of the stair with nary a sound.
If the entrance to… wherever this was looked a little hi-tech, the chamber down the stairs and through the corridor didn't hold back. It was a circular room festooned with hypnotic lights, murmuring monitors, spherical devices of whatever possible purpose and… was that a hologram projector? Amid it all, none other than Charlotte's father stood in the centre on a raised platform, already conversing with the holographic projections of a group of complete strangers to Charlotte.
"I'm afraid to give an uneventful report, but given you're not in the mood for surprises, that's naturally what you want. Isn't it?" Honoré chuckled in his deep rasp. Like his daughter he was on the lanky side, his blondish-auburn hair wiry and straw-like unlike his daughter's fuller brown. His gaze was hidden behind scarlet shades, and while he was never one for dressing casually, the black-jacketed, white-trousered uniform he wore still looked strange to Charlotte.
She was able to duck and hide beneath the platform's circular edge as these hologram people asked her father, "So this Future Psyche remains stable? No insurgencies have emerged? No Remembered Dead summoned on its own? No events that may 'inconvenience' our True Future?"
Future Psyche? Remembered Dead? True Future? The Hell are they talking about? Those questions buzzed like wasps within the crouching Charlotte's mind.
"See for yourself," Honoré said, as he then projected a series of images on all the monitors. All these images displayed were normal scenes from Etoile de Sant Michel and the surrounding countryside... including more than a few taken from within Charlotte's school.
Though Charlotte had no love lost for her father, the fact that he, for whatever twisted reason, had been setting up cameras in her school, or had hacked any existing cameras, made her want to lunge out. Oh, you want an insurgency? I'll give you an insurgency, tete de merde! Only at the last second did her self-preservation get the better of her.
"Well then, Agent Chretien, your efforts have been more than satisfactory," whoever these transmissions were agreed on, "Of course, we will contact your fellow Officer assigned to this Future Psyche to compile our full report."
"I see…" Honoré said, any cockiness he had suddenly gone. Before he could then sign off, he and these mysterious transmissions then proclaimed in unison, "Ave Horologium! Ave Verum Futurum!"
That motto or whatever flew completely over Charlotte's head. Hail… Hail True… she tried to recall what little Latin she remembered, but she was then distracted by a series of flashing lights that were emitted from the platform once the 'Horologium' or 'Futurum' people had gone. Red-Purple-Purple-Blue-Red. This was then followed by a loud click, like something had been firmly locked into place.
Honoré then turned to go, but as he got on the stairs leading back, he stopped for a second. Charlotte was deer meets headlights as her father almost looked back, but a stroke of luck saw him just shake his head and walk back up the stairs.
Charlotte waited to make sure he really was gone, but then found she may've waited too long when a loud screech and thump came from atop the stairs. Scrambling up there, she gasped on seeing that Honoré had shut the bookcase door behind her, with her unable to find any knob or switch with which to open it from within here. She had no idea whether trapping her in here was his intent, but she'd already decided he was a bastard either way.
She took a while to rein her rising outburst in, but upon her doing so, her instinct was to head back to the chamber with the control panel. It had to have some way of getting out of here, surely. Not that Charlotte could make heads or tails out of anything there upon walking back down, worried that anything she touched would alert 'Horologium' again, or whatever they called themselves.
Checking the central platform, she did notice that the dais her father had stood by had a colour wheel attached, which likely explained the lights. Those coloured lights had made enough of an impression that Charlotte had little trouble pressing the buttons in sequence again here… only for the dais to whirr and buzz in response, like she'd done something wrong. She took a step back, not wanting to touch it again for fear she'd blare forth an alarm… only to then try again anyway, figuring she had no other lead on getting out of here.
This time though, she inputted the colour sequence in reverse (red-blue-purple-purple-red) and sighed with relief upon being greeted by an affirmative ting. Then the dais no less than split itself into neat quarters, presenting before her a dark green disc that looked almost like a buckler, right size too. No, on second thought it reminded her of something else entirely. Wait, I know! The Antikythera Mechanism, from all my History classes. Not that I can remember any teacher saying one insightful thing about the device, and I doubt Honoré of all people got his hands on anything more than a copy. But copy or no, what's some astronomical proto-computer thing doing here?
She reached out to touch this 'Antikythera', only for it to spring forth in a split second and clamped down hard on her left arm, right where a buckler would be. Even if Honore had left, Charlotte still strained to stifle a shriek, with her flinching as this thing latched onto her like a parasite. Though the mechanism pierced into her no further, Charlotte still gritted her teeth and seethed as she tried to yank the thing off, only for each pull to make the rings and gears atop it start spinning like an old telephone dial. Which, somehow, made a great shining light flare out of its core...
As this story is about summoned figures from history and fiction, if you are a Fate/ fan you of course can still read this, I'm always happy to have more readers. But keep in mind that Revalkyrie was written with people who don't like the Fate/ franchise as its target audience
Quite a few of the profiles from my Character Compendium will still show up, but with anything Fate/-specific removed (which I never included much of anyway, so that shouldn't be an issue)
The moment the flash subsided, someone or something appeared before Charlotte. Before she could even look, Charlotte immediately scrambled back and nearly screamed, her first thought being that this was some Horologium Agent. But on seeing who this stranger was, a slender young man with wavy hair, if he was a Horologium Agent he was sure different from what little she'd of them.
Her impression of this stranger's outfit, with a folded light red shirt and dark green flowing trousers, was some kind of kendo gi or kimono. Well, those were the closest comparisons she could think of, oh wait, 'hakama' was the word, right? Point was, this style of dress was nothing like the coldly professional uniform her father was wearing.
Charlotte was starting to think she should've brought her sword down here, even as feeble as a school fencing foil would be in a real fight. Lacking that, she tried to stare right at this summoned whoever and demanded, "Alright. Who are you, and what are you doing here? Give me one reason why I can trust you're not with Horologium!" Whoever they even are.
It was then this stranger no less than knelt right before Charlotte, even offering his outstretched hand to her. "Lady Summoner, I assure you that before I manifested here, I'd never heard the word 'Horologium' in my life. I mean you no harm, I truly wish no one harm."
Whatever comfort Charlotte may've wanted to take in those words, she could only shoot him a jagged glare. "Okay, Horologium or not, what's with that poncy way of speaking? God, you sound like a complete creep! Just speak plain French, won't you?" She of course was aware that many from overseas would say the French language was already poncy, but well, that was beside the point.
The hakama-clad stranger blinked for a second, before he said, "Forgive me, my Summoner, I confess I had the impression I was speaking as anyone of my station would, and that… aren't we both speaking Japanese?"
Charlotte paused hearing that. English was the only foreign tongue she was that skilled in, more out of necessity and Olivia than anything. Bit of Spanish and Italian too, given their closeness to French. Japanese was right out, other than the basic words everyone her age knew like 'sayonara', 'ohaiyo'… er, 'baka', 'kawaii', 'nani', 'desu', those sorts of words. Yet to whoever this guy was, she was a fluent speaker. "Er, guess this thing came with a translator?" she said, looking down at the Antikythera.
"Such can be achieved so simply in this age?" the stranger asked.
Charlotte groaned, "No it can't. Don't think this thing on my arm is normal no matter what this 'age' is. Argh, look, you say you don't work for Horologium, so you don't know the name 'Honoré Chretien' do you? 'Agent' Chretien apparently. You're not on his contacts list or anything?"
This stranger smiled at her. "I assure you, that is a name as unfamiliar to me as 'Horologium'. In case I do, more of a description might help."
"By another name? So, like a middle name or something?" Charlotte asked.
"'Middle name'? No, I'm referring to one of his titles," he said.
"Titles?" Charlotte now burst out laughing at that, "You mean like nobility or something? Yeah right, Honoré wishes. Outside of these Horologium pals of his, guy's nothing but a deadbeat dad. Oh, that, ahem, suppose it was gonna be brought up sooner or later," her tone lowered as she shrank back, "Honoré… is my dad. I'm not at all comfortable saying that."
"Truly?" this stranger gasped, "Sorry, it's just… the mere thought of holding your own father in such open contempt. I don't know the man, so you may be more than justified. But to just outright say that, that's… something I once thought unbelievable."
"Seriously?" was all Charlotte said to that. Well, until she said, "Huh, just told you my surname, didn't I? Okay then, think our intros are overdue. I'm Charlotte Sigalsis Chretien, no really, that's my middle name. Either Honoré was a dick again or my Mum had an, ahem, 'interesting' sense of humour. But it sounds like your dad genuinely gave a damn about you, didn't he?"
"In what time he had," the boy muttered, "He, well, died when I was quite young."
Charlotte didn't know how to respond to that, though couldn't keep herself from thinking Lucky you. While she didn't manage to say anything, she at least nodded in response.
Sensing the downturn in mood, the boy tried to laugh and said, "Also, again with these 'middle names' of yours. Ahem, well then, I am no less than Minamoto no Yoshitsune, at your service Lady Chretien. I confess, it's odd to think I'm bowing to a commoner, but I do suppose I'm now of an even lower rank in society, being declared… an outlaw. Anyway, do excuse my arrogance, but I take it you've heard the name?"
"…Nope, doesn't ring a bell. Though you're starting to sound like some Robin Hood type," Charlotte said, that name registering nothing in Yoshitsune. She then smirked, "The way you talk, sounds like they'd bring you up in classrooms. Though sorry to say, my school barely teaches anything about other countries. Well, anything worthwhile."
"You know, that may be for the best," this Yoshitsune then said, "I, ah, don't want to divulge much, but I'm concerned what future generations might think of me. Many things were already said of me in my short life."
"Wait, 'future generations'? And you said 'age' before," Charlotte tensed as she heard that, her prior smirk gone, "You're really saying you... time travelled? I mean, kinda makes sense, you already act and dress like someone from way back. Just, how far back?" And what does the Antikythera Mechanism even have to do with time travel, is this some relativity thing?
"I was born in the dwindling of the Heian era," Yoshitsune said, before he looked around and added, "Which judging by the technology in this room, must have surely been centuries back. A millennium, possibly…" He then stood silent, looking burdened with the weight of what he just said.
Charlotte again looked down at the Antikythera, her whole head abuzz if not aflame with such a revelation upon her. She then said, "I can't believe it. Yeah, time travel being a thing is... a lot for me to process, but you're seriously from that far back?! I really just plucked some medieval warrior from doing whatever?!"
"Not just 'whatever', Lady Chretien. I most distinctly remember dying, so if anything," Yoshitsune said, then struggled to admit, "I likely am a ghost. Now I cannot say that for certain, I mean I certainly don't feel incorporeal, but if I am, then," again he paused, "then I'd be a cursed existence. At best, it would make me no worse than the tengu, but most likely I'll be in need of the soonest exorcism."
Hearing these words, Charlotte on instinct no less than slapped this past warrior. "Get a hold of yourself! Even if you are a ghost, I-I won't let you, o-or any other ghost, just destroy themselves like that," she burst out with, before her voice softened with, "That just sounds like suicide talk to me, and I'd know because… because of things."
"Lady Chretien," Yoshitsune began, then picked up, "Would you prefer Lady Charlotte? Your family name, unusually, seems to cause you distress. Ahem, Lady Charlotte, I assure you seeking one's exorcism is not comparable with taking one's life. In this case, there is no true 'life' to take."
"Look, whatever," Charlotte then said, "Forget all that, let's just try to get out of Honoré's weird basement already. Hey, got any feats of daring escape or whatever? Hell, if you are a ghost, you could at least walk through walls."
"Escape, yes, but not from captivity," Yoshitsune said, "My finest 'jailbreak' was to avoid being put in jail in the first place. But I'll see what I can do." He started to explore, but the sandals he was summoned in clanged against the floor as he did.
"Hey, take your shoes off!" Charlotte hissed at him.
"Why Lady Charlotte, surprising you extend the same courtesy to the enemy base as one would their own home," Yoshitsune began, but quickly realised, "Oh wait, the noise, that's why." He then walked up the stairs before reaching what would be the door back into the house, with him calling out, "I take it this is the entrance?"
Charlotte ran up behind Yoshitsune to see he was crouched in front of the entrance muttering something strange; a bundle of feathers having appeared in his hand. He then cautioned Charlotte to stand back, before he somehow called forth a gale force blast. "What the hell?" Charlotte called again, "First off… what did you even just do? Second, do you honestly want Honoré to find out we're down here?!"
"I wasn't trying to blast down the door, merely push it open a little," Yoshitsune insisted, before he took note of his feathered fan and said, "Ah yes, I do suppose that deserves an explanation. Lady Charlotte, I assume you're aware of the tengu? I did just mention them."
Charlotte had to think about that one. "Er, kinda. They're like, Japanese bird goblin people, aren't they?" she said. Where is this going?
"That's one way of putting it," Yoshitsune said, "I'm no tengu myself, but I did learn much from them, control over the winds being one of their common arts."
"Wait, 'arts'? You mean, like what people call magic?" Charlotte said, before she slumped down and moaned, "Jesus, hidden bases and organisations, time-travel ghosts, now monsters and magic? I don't- I don't even know anymore."
Yoshitsune at first didn't know how to respond, but he then settled on, "If it helps, I'm not particularly noted for my magic, my own authority over the winds would be paltry compared to say a Kusanagi wielder.
Hmm, perhaps we ought to examine more of the room below, see if there's another way out?"
Those last words made Charlotte immediately spring up and run back down. Last thing I need right now is Mr. Modernity-Illiterate messing with some hidden security alarm, she thought. It was then she got an idea, as she then tried to position the Antikythera over the various control panels, thinking maybe they'd pick up Honoré's signature on it and quiet down. Soon enough, she had what she hoped was some success, with its presence causing a circle of lights to glow blue…
…Then create a great blinding light that made both Yoshitsune and her vanish.
Charlotte then found herself somewhere close in design to her father's basement base, so close she almost thought that had been but another flash of light. But no, she soon saw she had been teleported somewhere else, as there was now a door right in front of her instead of way up that staircase. It opened onto a desolate corridor made of the same dark, green-tinted glass, with chill and bitter air seeping in.
At least the flash hadn't made Antikythera summon someone else, which made Charlotte realise she had no idea how many 'Remembered Dead' it could summon at once. Guess that's the term. Grr, to think I would've loved to be able to do something like this, summoning famous people from way back in the past, well so Yoshitsune says he is anyway. But no, these weird Horologium people have to wreck any fun I could get out of this, she thought.
Speaking of Yoshitsune, he'd been teleported along too. "Still too late to try the tengu fan on the door?" he chuckled. If this was his way of making light, Charlotte could only frown in return.
After that, Charlotte slowly stepped out and looked to either side to get a better view of this corridor. Or tried anyway, as she had to immediately duck back in. She saw there were at least two Agents on patrol, assumedly lower-ranked as their uniforms were less elaborate than Honoré's. "Hey samurai, any ideas? Best I can think of is we just wait here till those guys have moved on," Charlotte said.
"We do have the option of conversing with them," Yoshitsune said, "Far as I'm aware, you've done nothing intentional to slight Horologium thus far."
"What? Hell no, these guys have totally been spying on me and my whole town! Like I care to play nice with them," Charlotte snarled, arms folded.
"I see. Well if that's how it is, fret not, taking out a guard or two is a simple matter," Yoshitsune said, as he then pulled out a bow from… somewhere, presumably from wherever he'd stowed that tengu fan. "Oh, this?" he pre-empted any questions Charlotte could have, "If I am a ghost, my one bow would be one part of my, hmm, 'spiritual essence' you could say. If I am but a memory, this'd be one of many bows I'm remembered using. Not that those are any more than guesses right now."
With that, Yoshitsune was able to snipe both guards, with a bit of altering the wind to make his arrows hit just the spot. Charlotte then moved out to inspect the fallen guards, then went pale and gasped, "You, you just killed them, didn't you?"
"No, merely caused enough blood loss to leave these two unconscious," Yoshitsune said a little quickly, "Outright killing them would only set this Horologium's sights on us all the more."
That Yoshitsune let these two live for reasons purely practical, going by his words anyway, didn't quite comfort Charlotte. Though she had to think to herself, The guy's an ancient warrior, stupid, of course he's gonna be prepared to kill people. Like, what else… what else I did expect? "Okay, while you're at it then, could you take out any security cameras?" she asked to shift the topic, but would Yoshitsune even know what those were? "Er, they're like little mechanical eyes that people can use to see far away, like I dunno, crystal balls or whatever! Like, they're gonna know who we are if we don't take them out."
"You mean like spyholes?" Yoshitsune figured, before he started looking at the ceiling for anything that matched Charlotte's description. Sure enough, there was what looked like a tiny black eye peering out from a turn in the corridors, which he shot out with a single arrow.
"Hey look, if we still mess up it's all on you, I've never done stealth stuff like ever," Charlotte said, glossing over the contradictions in her words, "I mean, I put everything into fencing, not ninja training or whatever."
"Ninja? Another of your modern terms?" Yoshitsune had to ask.
"…The Hell, you seriously don't know what a ninja is?" Charlotte said, looking at him side eyed. Wait, shouldn't it have been translated for him, or is it cause the word's already Japanese? Or this translator thing probably has bugs in it. "Er, shinobi then, heard that word?"
"Ah, I see what you mean now," Yoshitsune said.
"Look, thing I was trying to say about stealth is yeah, shooting out cameras isn't gonna mean Horologium won't know someone's been here, but at least they're not gonna know we were here. Well, that's the idea…" Charlotte said, all the negatives in her sentence tying her tongue into knots. Maybe they'll think it's a blackout? Ugh, that's stupid…
"Fencer, you say?" Yoshitsune noted, before he produced another weapon, a sword that almost glowed with a bluish-green haze. "Then while we're making our escape, you may want to hold onto this for protection. Like most swords of my time it was designed for horseback, but you'll find it's strong enough wielded from foot too."
"Wait, y-you're just giving me this?!" Charlotte called out.
"Well, I don't have three hands, and what hands I have are already full with my fan and bow," Yoshitsune said, "So this'll at least see my sword getting some use, until we can find you a weapon of your own of course."
"No, that's not it," Charlotte said, "I thought with like samurai that- that your sword is supposed to be your soul! Isn't that what everyone says?"
Yoshitsune paused hearing that, then said, "…The samurai must have changed a lot since my time, I'd say our pride were our bows and horses more than anything. I mean, I do have a close companion who equated samurai with their swords, but he was as always the exception to any rule.
Besides, I'm... not sure why that one sword was summoned with me. In short, it's not a weapon I consider myself worthy of."
Yet you think someone like me's 'worthy'? Also, swords aren't that big yet you feel you're not worthy, what sense does that make? "Okay, guess I'm learning a lot today," Charlotte mumbled, before she gave Yoshitsune's sword a few practice swings. This all brought the memory back of her losing at fencing in front of her own and her rival school, yet here, failure would mean more than just losing the finals. Trying to hold those thoughts at bay, she said, "Right, well, let's move out."
The two slowly headed through the base, a map they'd picked up from a collapsed guard showing they were at least heading towards some sort of exit. They reached a larger chamber, akin to a glass hangar but without any vehicles, well not now anyway. As Yoshitsune shot more guards and cameras, Charlotte tried slowly walking up to a guard to spring a surprise sword slash on him. Lifting Yoshitsune's sword up and bringing it straight down, Charlotte froze when she saw just what she'd done. The sword had sliced right down through the guard's torso, meaning what she was now looking at was a dead body. Dead because of her…
"Lady Charlotte, we must keep moving on-" Yoshitsune ran up to her to say, only to see her having sunken to her knees in front a corpse. "Look, we'll… talk about this the instant we get out of here. But for now, we have to keep moving!"
Despite that urging, Charlotte could only get back on her feet at a glacial pace. That was, until an unknown voice, sounding like more than just another guard, jolted her right up.
"You there, intruders! Stay right where you are!"
So I went back and forth a bit over who to have as Charlotte's first summon. Yoshitsune was her original summon back when I first came up with her character, way back before F/GO. When I came back to this idea a while after F/GO came out, I then planned to use Yoshitsugu Otani instead. But when I decided I'd be happier to abandoning Fate/ and make this an original work, I then switched back to Yoshitsune
Charlotte slowly turned around to face whoever that voice belonged to and, even if said voice wasn't deep or gravelly in the slightest, she still had to blink when she saw it belonged to a girl about her age. Brunette too, though her hair was curlier than her own, and rather than wear the standard Horologium uniform, this girl was clad in a dark green armoured dress that suggested no less than a wearable tank. Not that this girl was anti-Horologium either, since she'd labelled Yoshitsune and her 'intruders', so did this mean she was another of the 'Remembered Dead'?
With Charlotte still reeling from seeing a corpse before her, slain however intentionally by her own hand, she was in no further mood for yet another complication. "Says who?" she just said back to her. She even thought to brandish Yoshitsune's sword at her, but right now she hesitated to even look at the killing blade.
"Says Her Royal Highness, Commander of the British Empire!" this girl proclaimed. Or tried to proclaim, the quivering in her youthful voice not projecting that fierce an image.
Wait, this girl's a princess?! Definitely Remembered Dead then, unless Horologium has that much influence, Charlotte thought. Still trying to play it cool, she gave a smug grin and said, "Wrong side of the Channel, prep. We don't take kindly to royalty around these parts." She quietly ignored Yoshitsune being part of the nobility, well he did use to be.
The tank-princess gulped, not seeming like she knew how to respond. However, she then brandished what looked like some odd hybrid between a knighting sword and a wrench and said, "I see. I did hope I would be able to employ reason and not force-"
"Lady Charlotte!" Yoshitsune then called out, having heard the words this princess was saying. "Must you antagonise? Either way, this is no time to stop moving."
"-but I must provide a firm example, that we shall not tolerate subversives," the princess finished. It was then the whole floor began to rumble, as this princess called in a full-on WW2 tank.
Now Charlotte was the one ready to bolt again, while Yoshitsune, his previous urging aside, was left standing still from the sheer future shock of what this machine could even be. Charlotte had to grab his arm and say, "Hey, all you need to know about it is run!"
Not that they could for long, as a whole squad of guards had now run in between them and the window. The sight of one guard killed by her made Charlotte tremble at the idea of slicing her way through this squad, yet she couldn't really think of any other option. Until one did occur to her.
"Wait, can't you use a wind blast to blow them away or, or something?" she asked, "At least to deflect their bullets?"
Yoshitsune, having shaken off the sight of that tank, then said, "Actually, that does give me an idea." He then took Charlotte's hand and leapt up, his tengu magic making the two of them jump higher than humanly possible… and sending the tank right on course to crash into all these guards. The princess tried to quickly steer the tank to the side, but the guards also running in any direction just made the chaos worse.
Charlotte was left dizzy as she fell back onto the floor. "Hey thanks, but sheesh, warn me before you do that!" she burst out at Yoshitsune, even if he'd had hardly any time to do so.
"That's enough!" the tank princess said again, having aimed the turret right at Charlotte and her Summon. "Again I ask you, intruders, surrender… please! I do not wish to cause carnage like this."
"Then I'm afraid, Your Highness, that you've been chasing the wrong intruders all along. It is I you want," another voice called out. At that moment a redhead dressed like a noblewoman ran up and leapt onto the tank from behind, then tried to lift its entrance open. "I truly don't wish to go against the English throne, so please, let these two go."
"Orlando, y-you truly would- no! You don't understand, I must maintain the integrity of the Empire! It's what my family told me, it's what my parents now told me…" this princess said.
Orlando, wait, isn't that the paladin Roland's Italian name in legend? No, that doesn't make sense, why would they give a damn about going against the English throne then? Charlotte thought, despite knowing she had no time to. While this Orlando occupied the tank, Charlotte and Yoshitsune rushed over to the long, wide window… and now saw there wasn't some cloudy night on the other side, but cavern walls.
Old as the sword was, Charlotte was still easily able to shatter the window glass with a single swing from it. Yet it turned out this part of the base was much higher up than they'd guessed, with a long drop between them and the cave floor. "Lady Charlotte," Yoshitsune began, "I beg your forgiveness for what I'm about to do."
"About to do what?" Charlotte glared at him, before she was grabbed by Yoshitsune and pulled out the window along with him the very next second. She would've screamed all the way down, had not Yoshitsune conjured up a firm breeze behind them. Suddenly Charlotte found herself almost vertically running down the walls of this base with him, the wind somehow letting them to do that. With one last jump off the walls, the two found themselves very much alive down on the floor of the cave.
If Charlotte was left dizzy after that jump, then her whole world was sent spinning after that gale-assisted dash down the base, with Yoshitsune having to catch and hold her while her orientation returned to normal. Once she was able to stand up again, she asked, "Seriously, did we need that little stunt of yours? I know, maybe the elevators would've needed a keycard, but couldn't we have at least gone down the stairs or something before… that?!"
"Lady Charlotte, we'd already been spotted by one of Horologium's Dead. Had we not escaped there and then, more and more would've seen our faces," Yoshitsune said, but he then had to look at his now tattered and worn tengu fan and added, "Still, that 'stunt' as you say did take a lot out of my powers, so you're wholly correct there. Hopefully we won't run into too taxing a fight as we leave this cavern."
Charlotte smirked at Yoshitsune admitting that. Looking down at his sword though, she was only given further reminder that she'd now killed someone, passed that line. Not really in self-defence either, it was a stealth attack. I-I didn't mean to kill that guard, so it was manslaughter, not murder, right? …Not that it'll matter, 'cause if Horologium really are as powerful as they're made out to be, they could be running the courts for all I know. "Yoshitsune," she then asked, "Do you, um, do you remember the first time you killed someone?"
Yoshitsune had to wrack his head for the answer to that, before he confessed, "Not really, no. Of course, I was born and raised into a life where killing, at least in war, was what you were trained for. Maybe that's why we have the samurai class, for us to carry the burden of killing people so others wouldn't have to?"
Right, and to have the means to kill anyone from those other classes when they spoke out against you, Charlotte had to think. I mean, I know next to nothing about Japan's history, and even I can tell that's the storybook version. What she did say to Yoshitsune was just, "Yeah well, let's get going already, they'll catch us in seconds if we stick around here".
Heading further into this cavern, the two soon got a bigger picture of what this base was. From the outside, Horologium's hideout here looked like a giant machine, shaped like a titanic mole with a drill and treads instead of a nose and feet. Charlotte had to take a step back at the sight of this... thing, and given Yoshitsune had been caught completely off-guard by the invention of tanks, she couldn't fathom how he'd be processing what he was seeing. On impulse, Charlotte just grabbed his arm and ran with him further into these caves, trying to supress just what sort of power she'd gone and made enemies with.
They soon made their way out of the giant mole cavern and into a series of tunnels, which with their wooden beam supports looked like they'd been man-made, or at least man-modified. With World War tanks still on her mind, Charlotte was even reminded of dugout shelters by them. All this, tunnels, cavern, giant mole base, under Etoile de Sant Michel, it's like some friggin' cosmic prank, she thought.
While these tunnels seemed deserted at first, it wasn't long before they noticed they weren't alone in here. At first there came what sounded like wood clapping against the stone floor, before someone looking like a young boy, a few years younger than Charlotte, came into view. He was dressed maybe a little old-fashioned, a little 19th century schoolboy, but nothing too out of the normal beyond that… until Charlotte spotted the joints in his neck and on his wrists, joints like a marionette.
She saw Yoshitsune keeping an eye on his bow, but for now he tried the diplomacy he'd recommended before, as he approached this 'boy' and asked, "Hello, and what would you be doing here? Hmm, I don't suppose you'd be with Horologium, now would you?"
"Huh, Horologium? N-no sir, why I've never even heard the name," this boy began, but the instant he said that his wooden nose suddenly shot forth, with Yoshitsune swiftly dodging this rapid growth to the side.
"Wait, seriously? Okay, this friggin' stupid prank or dream can end, because I am not just talking to Pinocchio right now!" Charlotte yelled out. Remembering anyone from Yoshitsune's time and place would have no idea who that was, she told him, "This guy's definitely an Agent, 'cause in his story his nose grows when he lies."
"Ah, not a fellow wielder of tengu magics then?" Yoshitsune said, before he had to explain, "Tengu are linked with long noses because of their beaks, and-" he then had to dodge another sideswipe from the liar's nose, "I'll go over this later."
A single sword swing by Charlotte was enough to severely lop off this wooden boy's grown nose before another puncture or swipe by him, the lack of any blood at least a relief for her after last time.
But it turned out this Pinocchio may have only been a lure, as a Horologium guard each then showed up on either side of the tunnel. Yoshitsune instantly shot the first one he saw, but that still left the guard brandishing his gun behind him… only for that guard to then suddenly be shot in the back.
"So, you met with the Orlando woman, yes?" whatever woman had shot the guard asked theme, her voice deep and Russian-accented. She walked further towards Charlotte and Yoshitsune, them now seeing she was a platinum blonde, ponytailed woman with coppery skin, dressed in a black cut-off jacket and brown cargo pants, carrying a knife and revolver. "I will be honest, I do not trust that Orlando, one of such aristo blood cannot truly have the people's interests at heart, much as she claims she is no longer a Horologium pig."
Yoshitsune twitched at that aristo comment, while Charlotte just asked, "Okay, so who are you then, another Remembered Dead?"
"Dead? Not at all, I am Octobriana, Star of the Revolution!" she proclaimed, "and I am what you call an Immortal… which is basically a Remembered Dead without the Dead, ya? As is Orlando, to her credit, but I still have one up on her in that also, I am a Time Traveller. A true Time Traveller, not like you, Dead," she then pointed at Yoshitsune, "or these Horologium pretenders."
Charlotte had to laugh at that. "Immortal? Time Traveller? Okay okay, I'll totally take your word for that, babushka," she called her, before she considered, "Wait, how can Horologium 'pretend' to be time travellers?"
Octobriana glared back, then asked, "You would have heard the term 'Future Psyche', little bird?"
That phrase did ring a bell. "Yeah, it was something I overheard Horologium was bringing up with Honoré. So what are they, then?" Charlotte asked.
"Honoré Chretien, her father," Yoshitsune clarified, much as Charlotte wished he hadn't.
Octobriana gestured at the world around her. "Everything you see, hear, touch, smell, even taste, all a Future Psyche, and far from the only one. These tunnels, that one Horologium base, that quaint little town above us, all a single Future Psyche."
"What the hell? You're not making any sense," Charlotte frowned on hearing that, before she tried restraining herself to ask, "Okay, fine, this is all a 'Future Psyche', but you still didn't explain what a Future Psyche actually is."
"A world inside the human mind, formed from what the people have collectively predicted the future will be. Diving into what people think the future will be is the closest thing to time travel Horologium can amount to," Octobriana said.
"You realise you completely contradicted yourself," Yoshitsune spoke up, "If you, like Urashima Taro, can enter into the future, then shouldn't you be able to definitely disprove these Future Psyche visions?"
Octobriana shrugged. "I am but one person, I cannot control what the people predict, nor would I want to, I would be no better than Horologium slime. I may have reached a real future, but the people all as one have not. Besides…" she gritted her teeth, "For some reason, my time machine can only access each Future Psyche's own timeline right now."
"Yeah, and how is my world in any way the 'future'? What, did a bunch of people predict that absolutely nothing would happen? I know, giant mole base and teleporters, but that's all Horologium," Charlotte said.
"Sorry, but am I question vending machine?" Octobriana said as she crossed her arms, "That you can figure out yourself. Fine, here is hint, you see these tunnels? They were here before Horologium; now think why they might have been built. Oh, and if you still insist this is the 'real world'…"
While they'd been talking, Pinocchio had been slowly trying to sneak away. Octobriana however swooped in and grabbed him before he could fade into darkness, and after being throttled around by her, he shrieked out, "Okay, okay! Yes, everything this woman said was true, this is a Future Psyche!"
His nose didn't grow, not one bit. That of course only made Charlotte insist, "Oh come on, he could just have incomplete info! I've spent my whole life in this town, how can you say it's all some people's speculations?"
"No, I can see the logic behind this," Yoshitsune then said, "There are many who teach that the 'real', physical world is but an illusion, so this new world being but a product of the mind is little of a stretch."
Before Charlotte could think of a response, the woman called Orlando from before, a little worse for wear after that tank battle, came running up to Octobriana. "Ah, a relief to see we all escaped. In the case of you two, I was worried for certain you were gone," she said, noticing Charlotte and Yoshitsune.
"Good, now hurry up. We are leaving," Octobriana just told her.
"Wait, Miss Octobriana, don't you see?" Orlando said, "This girl has no less than gotten her hands on an Antikythera Mechanism, able to use Horologium's summons against them. She would be invaluable to our cause!"
"Hey, whatever the 'cause', I can get back to you later," Charlotte said, "Sheesh, I just wanted to get back to my house, get some shut-eye before school tomorrow."
"You heard her," Octobriana said again to Orlando.
Of course, Charlotte then had to say, "No, wait, one last thing. That 'Honoré Chretien', he's supposed to be one of the two Officers in charge of this-" she then sighed using the term, "'Future Psyche', I know this from eavesdropping on him."
"Honoré Chretien, you say? Ah, at last we know the name of the other Officer," Orlando said with a smile.
"So then you know who the other Officer stationed here is?" Yoshitsune picked up on.
"Yes, typical bourgeoisie woman," Octobriana said, "Name of Danielle Vernier."
That name made Charlotte freeze up, with her managing to mutter, "Danielle… Vernier. You mean, no, you can't mean my mother…"
"Another fruitful report, Agent Vernier. Your fellow stationed Officer would agree," came Horologium's evaluation of their second Officer assigned to this Future Psyche, with this Vernier having to twitch at that reminder.
You could see the family resemblance between Danielle Vernier and Charlotte, if you could make the former out in this green half-light, with both mother and daughter being tall, lanky, and brunette. Not that words like 'scrawny' or 'ragged' could ever be used to describe Danielle like they could Charlotte, Danielle's hair lush and flowing where Charlotte's was messy and scraggly, and her elegant, almost aristocratic dress would look try-hard on Charlotte. Well, so Charlotte herself may have thought in some timeline where she and not her brother been taken by her mother. Had that happened though, Charlotte probably could've prodded back at her mother by pointing out her slowly spreading wrinkles and grey streaks.
Despite such a description, Danielle's parting recital of "Ave Horologium! Ave Verum Futurum!" sounded less elegant or refined, and more simply going through the motions. Not like that was out of the blue, given just how long Danielle had been with Horologium.
Afterwards, she exited upwards into the Victorian-style, or rather Second Empire-style, manor she called if not home, then at least her own base. Still, it was remarkable such architecture had even survived what this Future Psyche had gone through, and she knew Etienne, her son, for sure would've called this house a home.
She slumped down on one of her couches, the room lowly lit by a chandelier in a way intended to resemble candlelight. To think Etienne was already eighteen, to think Charlotte was already eighteen, ahem, and that she could no longer employ the 'not till you're older' reasoning on her son when she told him why he couldn't have an Antikythera of his own.
"My, something the matter?" a voice then asked her. It of course belonged to one of the many Remembered Dead Danielle had summoned, in this case a woman with bright, reddish-orange hair and clad in a dark gown. But by far the most striking feature of this Dead wasn't herself, but the leopard she had with her on a leash. A leopard that would've made anyone else try to run, but who Danielle was barely fazed by.
"No, nothing at all, but your concern is appreciated, Luisa. Just your standard Horologium busywork and," Danielle said before she sighed, "some reminiscing. The usual."
"My sympathies, sounds utterly drab," said the Remembered Dead called 'Luisa'. "But moving on, I've prepared a mannequin of your daughter, per your commission and instructions. You should naturally be head over heels, for I don't arrange such art as this for just anyone. Well Madam Vernier, is this not your spitting mental image of your daughter?"
She then had a brunette, school uniform-clad mannequin wheeled in, one few if any would've been able to tell from a real human at a glance. A beaming Danielle spent a while looking up and down at her daughter's duplicate, before she said, "Wonderful, it's just how I picture her. Perhaps, in the hopefully unlikely event my real daughter runs afoul of my organisation, we could even get our Valkyrie Brynhildr to save her by storing her soul in here."
Luisa snorted at that, "Oh sure, the moment our Brynhildr escapes the delusion that she's some fairytale princess. I will remind you, Madam Vernier, that my mannequins are no less than works of art, my own family even, not merely a means of giving people 'extra lives' if I understand that term correctly," she said.
"I know, I know," Danielle said, then smirked, "It's why I haven't ordered a soul-storage mannequin of myself; I of course have no intentions of dying. Plus, unlike my daughter, I already know what I look like." She then had to chuckle, "Were we in the Present Day though, I could simply look her up on social media, she'd have to be on something. As it is, I'm relegated to guesswork."
"Or you could just drive from here down to that Sant-Michel town and see for yourself, not that it isn't a most dull drive," Luisa said, having to roll her eyes at the thought.
"Well that, and that sort of behaviour sounds a mite stalkerish to me," Danielle said, as if trying to create a whole replica of Charlotte wasn't.
"Curious why only now you're commissioning a replica of your daughter, given how long ago your divorce was?" Luisa asked.
"Oh, don't think the thought didn't cross my mind back then," Danielle said, "But think of the impact creating a copy of his sister would've had on Etienne's developing mind, how he'd keep growing while the mannequin stayed the same. No, better he learned to accept my divorce at a young age, come to terms with it sooner than later. I already made the choice to be open with him about Remembered Dead, I didn't want to push my luck even further."
Danielle could only hope, all the way across the wastes and down in Etoile de Sant-Michel, that Charlotte was doing well. That she was happy, despite her remembering full well that Honoré was not the most pleasant of people. That all this really had been worth it for the sake of Horologium's 'True Future'…
It took Charlotte straining to push aside a rock, almost a boulder, in the way before she and Yoshitsune were finally above ground again. White moon already high in a black sky, the two seemed to have emerged by some barrows near the edge of town, an old gravesite or rather its remains. It was but a downhill run to the outskirts of Etoile de Sant Michel.
"So, you think these tunnels, and that princess who confronted us, both hail from an event you call 'World War 2'?" Yoshitsune asked.
"Yeah, those tunnels would've been part of a resistance network, least I figure, France being occupied at the time," Charlotte said, perhaps pushing what Octobriana had told her to the back of her mind, "You think I would've heard about my town having had a resistance unit, but no. Ugh, and of course Horologium had to set up shop there, spit on our grandparents' or great-grandparents' legacy." Not that she knew if any of the Chretien or Vernier lines had been in the French resistance. "WW1 dugouts are another possibility, or y'know, why not both?"
"Pardon, but you said your whole country was occupied back then?" Yoshitsune had to ask.
"Oh right, by the Nazis. Our government did nothing to stop them, so the people had to," Charlotte explained, though twitched when she realised she sounded like Octobriana for a second. Talking about the Axis also reminded Charlotte about Imperial Japan and how to broach that subject with Yoshitsune. Given that WW2 was, so to say, a big deal, it was distressingly likely he'd come by that information on his own sooner or later.
"The entire world at war, and twice? To think just Japan at war with itself felt vast enough in my era," Yoshitsune said. Charlotte shuddered for the inevitable question about WW2 Japan to be asked, but Yoshitsune kept any further musings to himself. Of course, not that the middle of the night on the outskirts of town was a good place to be discussing any of this.
It did bring something else to mind though, of Horologium being able to summon people from that time. That tank princess already looked straight out of WW2, so did this mean… even Nazis could be summoned? No, that princess was clearly British, so Horologium wouldn't have both Allies and Axis in their command… would they?
Anyway, they soon reached the outside of Charlotte's house, where Yoshitsune stopped to stare up and down at it, the same as he had with each house they'd passed by around here. "…The Hell's your problem?" Charlotte asked.
"Well, I don't think constructing your homes out of stone is at all practical," Yoshitsune said, "When an earthquake comes, it'd risk burying you all alive."
"Earthquakes in France, seriously?" Charlotte had to smirk at him, "Okay I heard they get a few down south, but come on, in Burgundy?"
"…I see. Well, I suppose I ought not be surprised, these dwellings are far more restrained than that Horologium base being a giant machine rodent," Yoshitsune had to admit.
Honoré already having locked the door by now, Charlotte and Yoshitsune had to climb up and in through the window. Well, Charlotte had to climb, whereas it took Yoshitsune but a step and a jump to be able to make his way up there.
Now in the attic, Charlotte ran over to crash down on her bed, letting loose a great sigh of relief. "Well, night night. Been a," she yawned, "long day, so ugh, probably gonna be nodding off all through school tomorrow. Olivia's gonna be a real bitch about it too," she mumbled, head right up against her pillow.
"School? Forgive me, Lady Charlotte, but aren't there more pressing matters?" Yoshitsune asked, "Shouldn't we spend the morrow gathering more information on Horologium, forming a plan of action even?"
Charlotte groaned. "Look, you have any idea how much I'm gonna get chewed out if I'm tardy tomorrow, truant even? Besides, Horologium's got spies and cameras all over my school, or so Honoré claims anyway, so really it should be our first port of call," she said.
"…Aren't those spies all the more reason not to go?" Yoshitsune asked.
"No, 'cause if I'm suddenly not there, they're gonna start getting suspicious. Plus, this way we get to smash all the cameras like back in the base; another victory for us!" Charlotte said, before crashing back down again.
"But that means they'll narrow you down to that school and- never mind, I can see your mind's well made," Yoshitsune relented. He then changed subject on looking at Charlotte's Antikythera, "You said you stole that from your father, right? Should you not hide it, lest he comes in here looking for it?"
"Pfft, as if! Guy hardly ever comes in my room," Charlotte said, her dozing off interrupted again, before she sighed, "Oh, alright. Help get this thing off me, will you?" Yoshitsune's strength and finesse was enough to finally detach the Antikythera from Charlotte's wrist, against the prior assumption that it had locked itself on there. "Okay, whew, now let's see…" Charlotte looked around for a hiding spot. My floorboards broke just last afternoon, yeah… only last afternoon, so I can- no, that'll just risk the Antikythera falling to the floor below, right back into Honoré's hands. Under my pillow? No, I need all the shuteye I can get right now, and that'll make for one hellish night's sleep. Wait, I know! "Okay, you see those boards holding up my mattress? Try slotting it in between one of those."
Yoshitsune had to stare at this type of bed for a second, but then slotted the Antikythera between board and mattress as told. This did make Charlotte's bed a little lopsided, but better than her having to deal with the mechanism being under the pillow at least. What did interrupt Charlotte getting to sleep again was another thought she had.
"Oh sheesh, don't tell me I also have to find you somewhere to sleep! Like, the only other bed in the house is Honoré's," she groaned out.
"Lady Charlotte, I'd say that's a matter you need not concern yourself with, at present anyway," Yoshitsune said, "I'm more than used to long hours, and being on campaign and… in hiding, you get accustomed to sleeping on rough surfaces. I can easily stand guard while you rest."
"Good, you do that. Still, you're like a ghost or a memory or something, why would you even need to sleep…" Charlotte murmured, before her baggy eyes finally gave way, and she drifted off into slumbering and snoring.
With such a late night, Charlotte would've been expected to sleep in past the school bell, but instead the flipside happened. After a half- or even quarter-night of tossing and turning, Charlotte stirred awake when the first rays of the sun came piercing into her room, a neighbour's rooster crowing seconds later. While she struggled to get out of bed at first, she then bolted awake when she saw her own fencing sword was missing from its sheath on the wall.
Her breath accelerating, Charlotte darted all over her room looking for the blade, but fortunately it didn't take her long to see just where it had gone. Staring out an attic window, she could see Yoshitsune in a meditative position beneath the tree in the backyard, or at least the marshy green and brown smudge that passed for her backyard, his own sword in his hand and hers having been placed right beside him. The serene Yoshitsune seemed to have become focused enough that, when a single leaf fell near him, he was able to unsheathe his own sword and slash the leaf in two in what looked like the blink of an eye.
"Pfft, show-off," Charlotte muttered, probably for the better that Yoshitsune couldn't hear her under her breath, after she climbed back down the drainpipe and went over to him. She looked down at her own sword and asked, "Uh yeah, the hell were you thinking to just take my things?"
"Oh, Lady Charlotte, I didn't expect to see you up at this early hour," Yoshitsune said, slightly startled. "I assure you; it was always my intent to return your blade before you woke, I just… miscalculated when that would be. And of course, I lent you my sword last night, only fair I should inspect yours. If I may be blunt, ah no pun intended, it's a rather odd make for a blade," he then picked up Charlotte's sword, "It appears designed entirely for thrusting, making it impractical for wielding on horseback."
"Duh, don't wield it from horseback then. Thrusting's what fencing's all about, okay that and parrying and footwork and stuff, so more of a slashing edge would be pointless," Charlotte said, herself not realising her own pun till seconds later.
"Yet that guard was the first time you'd ever killed anyone, even though in my experience, thrusting weapons are designed to be deadlier still than slashing ones," Yoshitsune said, "The blunted tip tells me this is a practice blade, but you would've been in training to kill and soon if they started you on a thrusting weapon. Granted, training to kill and actually killing are two different things…"
"What? Oh come on! You're from the Middle Ages, didn't they have like jousting tournaments in your time, or whatever the Japanese equivalent was? You know what a 'sport' is, right?" Charlotte said.
"You must truly live in a blessed time then, if swordplay can be treated as a game," Yoshitsune muttered in a resigned tone, "If Horologium will let this time remain blessed for long…"
"Yeah, but in the meantime I've got school and everything- oh wait," something occurred to Charlotte, "If I leave you here or somewhere to yourself, that could leave me right open for another Horologium attack. That princess of theirs saw my face, and friggin' Honoré's an agent, so they could already know what I look like…" she realised, her face growing paler with each word, "Okay, so I'll have you hang around me, wait, that'll mean we'll need to arrange a whole cover story."
"Ah, that suits me fine, I've had some experience in formulating aliases," Yoshitsune said, "People have thought I was just a simple flautist at times, and my companion and I, on one… memorable occasion, disguised ourselves as travelling priests-"
"I've got it!" Charlotte beamed, her words going over the top of Yoshitsune's, "I'll just say you're my boyfriend."
Yoshitsune's face sank hearing that. "Uh, Lady Charlotte, even as an act might that not be far too rash? We haven't even known each other a full day, and I'm afraid I do have a significant other in my life," he said.
"Oh come on, I said it's all a cover story, didn't I? And hey, hate to break it to you, but whoever your real girlfriend is, unless someone summons her, she's been dead for like a thousand years!" Charlotte straight up said. Having at least some awareness of how much those words must've stung, she then softened her voice and added, "Besides, um, much as I don't wanna admit, I'm not exactly that popular at school. Er, I guess you can see why. My classmates, let alone everyone else, mostly just avoid me, but if I bring a samurai along and say he's my boyfriend, they'll all totally be impressed!" Her tone shot up in the second half.
Yoshitsune sighed and said, "You know, back when I was a youth, well I suppose I still am, but anyway. There's a time when I admit I would've unashamedly gone along with a plan like this, I may have even formulated such an idea myself. But as I am now," he then paused, noticing Charlotte looking at him expectedly, "Fine, we can at least try this ruse out once."
"Hah, I can't wait to see what the looks will be on everyone else's faces!" Charlotte grinned.
Yoshitsune then added, "Just don't say I didn't warn you…"
Future Psyches: Glimpses of what humanity expects from the future - not necessarily the true future, but what it could be/have been.
Etoile de Sant Michel
A seemingly normal town that is in fact a Future Psyche, a glimpse of the future that could be. Despite its normality, there are many mysteries surrounding it.
Information: What is known about the Future Psyche thus far.
-Horologium's base is a giant 'mole tank' hidden in tunnels underneath Etoile de Sant Michel.
-The tunnels underneath the town were here before Horologium arrived, and the reason they were built is apparently why Etoile de Sant Michel is a Future Psyche.
-Charlotte believes that the tunnels underneath the town are remnants from WWII or WWI, either being remnants of a resistance network, dugouts, or both, having been dugouts at first before being repurposed. (Personal Thought: This doesn't quite line up with Octobriana's statement that the tunnel's presence has to do with why this is a Future Psyche, unless I missed something…)
Horologium Officers: Leaders of Horologium's operations within the Future Psyche.
Honore Chretien: Charlotte's father, a rather neglectful man who is one of Horologium's officers. Little is known about him concretely, but Charlotte does not have a good opinion of him.
Danielle Vernier: Charlotte's mother, who apparently divorced Honore. There is clearly more to this than it seems, as Danielle is another Horologium officer. Danielle, based on what is shown thus far, cares about her children…but isn't willing to go against Horologium for them.
Horologium Associates: Not quite officers, but linked to Horologium either way.
Etienne: Charlotte's brother, having gone with Danielle instead of Honore. He is aware of Horologium's existence, and has been for quite some time, unlike Charlotte. He apparently wants and Antikythera Device of his own.
Remembered Dead: Spirits from the past summoned back to life encountered in this Future Psyche.
Yoshitsune: Minamoto no Yoshitsune, and Charlotte's summoned Remembered Dead. Distinctly recalls dying before being summoned.
'Her Royal Highness': Another Remembered Dead, presumably. British Royalty. Seems somewhat doubtful of her role, and can summon a tank.
'Orlando': A mysterious Remembered 'Dead' (or rather, an Immortal) that works alongside Octobriana. Her name is that of the Paladin Roland's name, though in Italian. Whatever links this may have is unknown.
Pinocchio: A puppet Remembered Dead straight from fiction. Much like his legend, his nose grows whenever he lies, such as when he was asked if he knew what Horologium was.
Octobriana: A Remembered 'Dead' – she is actually an Immortal, and a 'true' time traveler in her own words. She is very much against Horologium, and claims that, for whatever reason, her time machine can only access each Future Psyche's timeline currently.
Luisa: A Remembered Dead that serves Danielle Vernier. Obsessed with mannequins, and can create incredibly realistic ones. Has created a mannequin of Charlotte in order to transfer her soul to it in case she dies, though Luisa does not have a good view of this.
Brynhildr: An unknown 'Valkyrie' that works with Horologium. They apparently have the ability to transfer souls to other vessels, but are also currently more concerned with 'the delusion that she's some fairytale princess', according to Luisa. (Personal Thought: Not sure if she is a Remembered Dead or not, considering the title and her being called a Valkyrie. I put her under Remembered Dead before I had this thought, and didn't feel like moving her, I think.)
For some behind-the-scenes stuff, I went back and forth a bit on whether to put the Danielle interlude in this chapter up front or in between the two Charlotte sections, went with up front as I felt it made a nice transition from the last chapter's end
I was also wondering whether Madame Tussaud would've worked better as an effigy creator to summon than Luisa Casati (her identity's not much of spoiler, but just in case) since while Luisa does have that 'mannequin twin' part of her life, it wasn't really her whole 'thing' like it was Tussaud's. Then again, the historical Luisa does have a much more vibrant personality to work with and I had a sheet of her all ready
Guess my biggest worry with the whole 'soul in mannequin' scene is that I'm trying to distance this story from Fate/ yet the mannequin thing kinda risks being too similar to Touko. Guess I wrote it that way because at the time I couldn't think of another hook to introduce Danielle with, but now I might possibly replace it with a scene introducing her with Brynhildr instead of Luisa (I consider the SV and SB versions of Revalkyrie more a 'polished draft' than anything finalised). Then again, it's possible nobody thought of Touko at all and I'm just overreacting
-Charlotte believes that the tunnels underneath the town are remnants from WWII or WWI, either being remnants of a resistance network, dugouts, or both, having been dugouts at first before being repurposed. (Personal Thought: This doesn't quite line up with Octobriana's statement that the tunnel's presence has to do with why this is a Future Psyche, unless I missed something…)
Just wanna say I've edited the chapter to try and reconcile these two statements, basically with Charlotte still partly being in denial about what Octobriana said despite the evidence. Though the tunnels being built in a World War then later going onto have something to do with the prediction that founded the Future Psyche is still possible
Anyway, I had a bit of break in writing over New Year's, but the next chapter is now coming along
Just wanna say I've edited the chapter to try and reconcile these two statements, basically with Charlotte still partly being in denial about what Octobriana said despite the evidence. Though the tunnels being built in a World War then later going onto have something to do with the prediction that founded the Future Psyche is still possible
Anyway, I had a bit of break in writing over New Year's, but the next chapter is now coming along
The Lycée Sant-Michel, the high school Charlotte went to, was a H-shaped building (or I-shaped depending on your angle) with a single belltower spiking up at one end. Like most buildings in town, it was largely made up of brown and grey stone and brick. Its students seemed just as grey as they shuffled their way through the courtyard, except for of all people Charlotte Chretien. Normally she would've either shuffled in like everyone else on a good day, and stomped her way across on any other, but today she had a smile on her face and a skip in her step, both once in a blue moon for her.
This appeared to be due to the boy she had around her arm, Japanese with swept hair and still adjusting to the shirt, tie, and trousers he'd put on. "So, this would be what is normally worn in your day and age?" he asked, trying to keep his voice low with that one question.
"Well, for guys yeah, and mostly when they wanna look presentable," Charlotte said. "Can't stand wearing a tie myself, makes me feel like I'm being choked. Okay, it's not that bad, but you get the picture. Either way, you wanna make a good impression, since it's your first time out in public, er, in the present that is."
"I see. I may also be a bit sensitive around my neck, due to…" Yoshitsune paused to hold his hand up to his collar for a second, "my personal history."
"Sheesh, aren't you vague? Keep talking like that, and I'll get more info on you from online than from, y'know, yourself," Charlotte hissed, only to notice she was attracting some stares from a handful of students passing by her. She had to restrain herself from telling them to butt out, with her remembering one of the reasons she had Yoshitsune masquerading as her boyfriend was to boost her popularity, So instead she said to these people, "Oh, hi~! Just being dropped off by my foreign boyfriend, bet you don't have one. Quick, play your flute," she whispered back at Yoshitsune.
The samurai took out an old, side-blown flute of his and began to perform. He'd mentioned that he was a flautist when Charlotte asked him earlier that morning if he had any talents worth showing off, help impress the crowds with. Of course, Charlotte back then also had to make a dig on how anyone could even learn the flute in war.
Well, it seemed to be working, as these nearby students and several of their fellows grew slowly entranced with the flute's melody. And what a mournful melody it was, like the flute sang without a voice of separation, of loneliness, of some final parting…
An increasingly giddy Charlotte went and said out loud, "Yes, people are paying attention to me again! I mean, they're paying attention to you, but you're with me, so that means it counts."
Yoshitsune, putting his flute away for a second, whispered to ask her, "Pardon me, but… why would you want attention drawn to you? Given our enemies, would it not benefit us to keep a low profile?"
Charlotte didn't know how to respond to that, the thought of Horologium seeping its way back to her, but she then whispered back, "Oh, relax. If anyone here's secretly with those guys, you can just hypnotise them and we'll get all the info out of them."
"And if they're not?" Yoshitsune asked in return, "Besides, my flute is no enchanted instrument. Just what do you think it's capable of?"
"Charlotte Chretien," a third voice spoke up from behind them, with Charlotte knowing automatically it was Olivia's. "Wait, who's this with you?"
Startled at first, Charlotte's expression soon relaxed into a smirk as she said, "Oh, he's just my new foreign boyfriend, and he's a flautist. His name's… name's," she realised an obvious flaw in her plan.
"Gikei," Yoshitsune swooped in to give an alias, before he bowed to Olivia and said, "Ah, you would be the Lady Charlotte's peer, I assume? She has, ahem, talked about you a fair deal."
Charlotte could've frozen on Yoshitsune saying that. Her being addressed as 'Lady' already weirded her out a little, but being called that in front of Olivia made her turn pink. Grr, didn't I tell him to act natural? Oh wait, samurai duh, this is 'natural' for him.
Olivia was not amused. "Charlotte, can we talk in private?" she asked her right in her face. Charlotte promptly went with her, mostly because she knew if she told her no, Olivia would've just dragged her along anyway. Once they were out of anyone's earshot, Olivia tugged Charlotte by her collar and asked her "Boyfriend? Then how come I, or anyone else here, have never heard of who- whoever this is? Just what is this stunt you're trying to pull?"
"Oh please, I've had plenty of time to get to know Yos- Gikei," Charlotte said, if 'since last night' could be called plenty of time, "and like you know anything about my personal life. Or like anyone else here even cares about my personal life," she crossed her arms.
"Charlotte, you want to know how I know this whole 'boyfriend' thing is a lie?" Olivia said, "Because I know if you too had known each other for that long, you would've rubbed him in my face long before now. You immediately brag whenever you have the tiniest thing to brag about, like every fencing trophy you ever won."
Charlotte was at least grateful that Olivia didn't phrase that as 'every fencing trophy you used to win'. Still, Olivia questioning her like this, even if it was hardly out of the norm for her, got Charlotte thinking and fearing. Wait, Olivia can't be an Agent, right? I know Mum and Honoré, of all people, are the Officers here, but they've gotta have subordinates. And Horologium would just love a real teacher's pet like Olivia.
"Huh? Charlotte, are you alright? You're starting to zone out," Olivia then said, her voice pulling Charlotte out of her thoughts.
"'Zone out'? God, you're dramatic, I was just… thinking. Thinking about a lot of stuff," Charlotte said back, "Y'know, like normal people do."
"Look, just focus on your studies before graduation, and don't," Olivia said, "don't go around doing anything stupid like, I don't know, stringing random strangers along and trying to pass them off as your boyfriend. Stop slacking off, and you'll have all the respect and attention you want." Her little ultimatum given, Olivia turned and headed off to class.
As Yoshitsune walked back up to her, Charlotte gritted her teeth and asked, "Where were you? Could've really used your soothing flute to make Olivia stop haranguing me."
"It would not have been my place to interfere," Yoshitsune said, "As this Olivia would appear to be your Lord, or rather your own time and place's version of one. I was tempted to intervene, but well, this was my first impression here, I'm worried I would've embarrassed us both."
"Well, you've really embarrassed yourself now, haven't you?" Charlotte rubbed that in, but she had to laugh at one thing. "Also, Olivia my Lord? Oh yeah, she wishes! True, she is Class President, but she still won't admit that title only exists to make students feel important. Augh, so anyway, anyone here give off Agent vibes yet?"
Yoshitsune sighed, "Afraid I have too little information to go at this point. My eyes however did spot a few of what you call cameras by the school gates."
Charlotte then turned her head to look at the main door, then said, "Good, that's something. Hey, I've got class right now, already forget whether it's Geography or Biology or whatever. So while I'm stuck with that, I'll need you to take out any camera you can find. Also," she added, eyes darting left to right for second, "keep an eye on Olivia, I know her enough to know she reeks of Agent. Yep, this'll be a cinch, we're already making a dent in Horologium's operations," she gave the biggest smirk.
Yoshitsune smiled but not without a twitch. "I admit I can sympathise with not caring much for your studies. However, I can't exactly share your enthusiasm about Horologium being so simple to take on…"
Charlotte spent any time not in class, and Yoshitsune any time he could move through the halls uninterrupted, rummaging through people's bags the moment they weren't looking and shooting down any cameras they could find. Yoshitsune naturally used his bow, while Charlotte less elegantly tried to throw rocks at them, given her sword couldn't reach up high enough. Both kept to aiming from the side, making sure not to get in any camera's line of sight before they wrecked it, though that could prove tricky when it came to cameras that rotated.
"Well, any news on Olivia?" Charlotte asked Yoshitsune behind a tree during lunch break.
"I obviously don't know every Horologium signifier, but so far I've found nothing tell-tale on her," Yoshitsune said, "unless Horologium have enchanted their insignia to be invisible."
"What, 'enchanted to be invisible'? Yeah, they could have cloaking tech on them, but sheesh, did you have to phrase it all mystical?" Charlotte asked, "Like c'mon, is invisibility another Tengu thing?"
"Actually, it is," Yoshitsune said straight-faced, "There are special cloaks they weave that shroud their wearer. The cloaks take quite some time to make though, I couldn't imagine equipping a whole army with them."
"…Did you seriously just say 'invisibility cloak'? Give me a break," Charlotte moaned. Afterwards, she said, "Right, I see two further courses of action. One's that I take a study session with Olivia to spy on her, find out if she's really with Horologium… which honestly is the last thing I wanna do. Oh, not because I think Little Miss Perfect is innocent, but because I really don't need another study session with her after my last one, I'd have to apologise and everything."
"And the other course?" Yoshitsune had to prompt a now rambling Charlotte.
"Oh yeah, the... other one," Charlotte suddenly shivered, "That's checking up on the guy we know for a fact is with Horologium, Honoré. I did steal his Antikythera after all," Charlotte's head turned towards her backpack, which had a hopefully not too noticeable lump in it, "Naturally he's gonna be looking for it. Wait, he would've used it to summon someone before, wouldn't he?"
"You're saying there could be another Remembered Dead around, tied to your Antikythera?" Yoshitsune inferred.
Charlotte shrugged, "Don't know how this thing even works, but I hope not. Maybe these things can only summon one at a time, so whoever Honoré had out has been dispelled? Unless him summoning Princess Tank or friggin' Pinocchio was all part of his plan."
"Ah, now you mention it, any ideas as to this princess' identity?" Yoshitsune asked.
Searching 'English Princess WW2' on her phone, Charlotte had to do a double take when she saw the results. "E-Everything here says it's… Elizabeth II," she said.
"A name of some renown?" Yoshitsune took it.
"'Renown'? She's like, the second-longest reigning monarch, well, ever!" Charlotte blurted out, before her flabbergasted face shifted to a grin, "Of course, my country still has Louis XIV, the longest-reigning monarch. Er, not that we care about kings of course!" she said with a swerve, before it occurred to her, Hell, there's a chance I could now meet Louis XIV in person… but probably not on good terms.
"Hmm, yet they seem to have summoned her from before she was even crowned," Yoshitsune said, "I at least doubt she has divine heritage, unlike the only royalty I've known."
"Huh, divine heritage? Oh yeah, the Emperor, I get it," Charlotte said, "I do know that English royals claimed, probably still claim, something called 'Divine Right of Kings' but I don't believe that for a second."
"Not unless Amaterasu or Dainichi Nyorai visited this England sometime in the past," Yoshitsune said, Charlotte only recognising the first of those names. He then thought to change the subject with, "Anyway, all this keeping alert for Horologium, I imagine it's already gotten in the way of your regular life."
"Pfft, what regular life?" Charlotte said, before her gaze drooped down, "Sitting by myself, only Olivia around just to nag me, not liking school but not wanting to come home. Yeah, some 'regular life'."
"Well, it may not be ideal, but I'd say your life's more blessed than you credit it for," Yoshitsune said, "You're neither aristocrat nor samurai, yet you're getting an education, you've never had to fear war till now, and you don't fear the disasters of nature."
Charlotte was about to say Oh, don't give me that 'Would you rather be starving in Africa' spiel, before she realised nobody else had ever gave her even that, unless maybe her mother said it to her as a child. Honoré simply didn't care what she thought of her life.
"Speaking of an education," Yoshitsune said to try to get Charlotte's mind off whatever it was on, "To make sure Horologium doesn't track us to just your school, we ought to try tracking any cameras hidden through town once you're allowed out."
"Huh? Oh that, yeah, makes sense," Charlotte said, just snapping back. It was then the bell rang again; Charlotte still barely having touched her lunch. "Yeah, once I'm allowed out…"
That afternoon, the two would find more than a few cameras scattered across town. Some had been hoisted up in a local park, several cafes had one each, and a supermarket was unsurprisingly full of them. That last one nearly placed Charlotte in a tight spot when she had to run hide behind an alley once the alarms went off, while Yoshitsune meanwhile fled by leaping right up on top of the building and then darted across the nearby roofs.
Of course, it wasn't until the adrenaline rush of smashing cameras wore down that Charlotte had to think, Wait, how do I know I didn't smash a bunch of normal, non-Horologium security cameras in the process? …Eh, like I care.
Panicked as she'd been when the alarm went off, even that was eclipsed by the trepidation she felt on returning home. She again felt the Antikythera hidden in her backpack, her breath nearly freezing up at the thought of Honoré seeing it on her. With secrecy to keep, she couldn't even rely on Yoshitsune either, well unless things went seriously south.
Yoshitsune nodded at Charlotte before he ran and sprang up to hide in her room. As Charlotte opened her door, well really her father's door, she looked around the house and, as she did most afternoons, saw nobody. She breathed out, Maybe Horologium stepped in and punished Honoré for losing his Antikythera? Or he's occupied with paperwork or whatever for them, at least that.
Charlotte was relieved as she took off her bag in her attic half-room, then smiled at Yoshitsune to signal that everything was clear. But upon her walking back down to the ground floor, she immediately found that 'clear' everything wasn't.
"Charlotte," Honoré said right at her, him simply saying her name being enough to send his daughter quaking.
"F-Father," Charlotte stuttered out, saying that word in all seriousness.
Honoré may have not said anything for a little while longer, but did narrow his gaze to look Charlotte up and down. "I do trust everything is as standard for you?" he then asked, or prodded as it felt.
"Y-Yes, I've been studying hard for, for graduation," Charlotte said, her face growing paler and paler.
Her father then glared right at her, like his eyes were piercing Charlotte's soul. Fortunately, all he said after that was, "Dinner's on the table. Oh, and Charlotte," he had to add the second she thought she was off the hook, "Just some advice, which I hope you'll take to heart. Do keep your hands to yourself." He then walked off, obviously not joining her for tea.
Charlotte was still shaking as she walked towards the dining room. 'K-keep your hands to yourself'? D-does that mean he knows about- she thought, No, then why's he being cryptic? Why not just say I stole it? Maybe he still doesn't know, b-but he definitely knows someone took the Antikythera…
With Honoré significantly out of the room, Yoshitsune ran right down to check up on his Summoner. "Lady Charlotte, is everything alright? I confess, I didn't have high hopes for your encounter with your father, but this- what power does he have over you?"
"I'm fine!" Charlotte then snapped, her usual tone of voice briefly coming back. "Look, he didn't outright say I stole the Antikythera, s-so that means we're fine, okay?!"
And things continued to be 'fine' for about another week, with the only indication that anyone was starting to suspect anything being when Olivia asked her right before class, "Charlotte, have you heard these reports around town that security cameras are being smashed, some even in our school?"
Charlotte nearly flinched being asked that, then on impulse asked Olivia, "What, so you think I'm responsible, is that it?"
"Well no, that would be leaping to conclusions," Olivia said at first, but then added, "However, I can't rule you out as the culprit. If so… Charlotte, what is going on with you? First your grades plummet, then you started parading around some stranger saying he was boyfriend, now everyone's talking about smashed security cameras around town!"
"So much not for leaping to conclusions," Charlotte muttered, then said clearly, "Olivia, if you wanna play detective, do it on your theatre stage. My business, whatever you think it is, is my own."
Charlotte then brushed right past Olivia and into class… only to become paralysed when she walked in on a new transfer student introducing herself. An uncomfortably familiar 'new' transfer student.
"Good morning, everyone," said no less than the 'tank princess', who all signs pointed to being the young Elizabeth II, as she curtseyed in front of the class, "I hail all the way from England, perhaps not the grandest distance, but our two countries certainly feel more separate nowadays. I do hope all of us will get along…"
Charlotte blinked and then rubbed her eyes to make sure she wasn't just seeing things. But of course she wasn't, all these previously unbelievable things she'd seen lately had shown themselves as very much real. This really was the same 'Remembered Dead' who'd sicced WW2 tech on her in that underground monster-mole base, now standing here as the new student in her class.
"Miss Chretien, would you please take a seat?" said Charlotte's glaring teacher, "You are intruding on Miss Mayfair's introduction."
Charlotte nodded in response and inched her way to her oaken desk, her classmates all snickering at her left her ears stinging. She felt like sinking beneath her desk, and not just to avoid detection from Horologium.
"No, it's quite alright, truly," this 'Miss Mayfair' said, "Miss Chretien was likely just caught off-guard by my sudden arrival, that's all. And yes," she then looked back at the rest of the class, "I indeed go by Margaret Mayfair."
Yeah, 'go by' being the keywords there, Charlotte thought, like I haven't totally figured out who you are.
"I've mostly studied history, geography, and the political sciences, but lately my interests have been turning more to engineering, which I realise is not the most normal interest among young women," this 'Margaret' said, though the class didn't seem to care.
What the class did care about was when a dog came rushing on through the door and leapt up into the transfer student's arms. Everyone staring at the sight, the dog could clearly be made out as a corgi, orange fur, stubby tail, and everything. Oh yeah, like I needed another clue as to who you really are, Charlotte thought, bet that corgi's a real help with softening Horologium's image, huh?
"Ahem, Miss Mayfair," it was Olivia who then spoke up, "like everyone else here, I do welcome you to our class, but… you are aware that, guide dogs aside, we have a 'no pets' policy?"
"Oh, my apologies. It is, well, more my dogs have a habit of finding me, that's all," 'Margaret' said, petting her corgi before shooing him off. Perhaps realising she ought to be finishing up by now, the new transfer student ended with, "And well, I suppose I've never really been to a normal school. But still, I hope my time here shall be a good one."
She then walked over to take a seat, and to Charlotte's lack of surprise, went with the empty one in front of her. This was despite calls from the rest of the class that went, "C'mon, why sit by Charlotte?" "Yeah, anywhere else!" "We all keep that seat vacant for a reason!"
Those comments made Charlotte grit her teeth and clench her hands. Great, now what? Having a Horologium Agent sit next to me is the last thing I want… but now everyone's got me wanting her to sit next to me, because fuck what they say, she thought, then sighed. Guess I'll just have to keep my notes real close to me.
"It appears I may have embarrassed you earlier," 'Margaret' then spoke to Charlotte, "I do apologise, so to do my part, I'm open to giving tutoring if it'd help."
Yeah, like I need your charity, or excuse to further spy on me, Charlotte had to restrain herself from saying, so instead went with, "Hey, I'll manage. Wait, Olivia didn't put you up to this, did she?"
"Olivia? Oh, you mean Miss Prevel," 'Margaret' said, "No, afraid we haven't talked much. The most I know is she's your Class President, so perhaps you could introduce us? She sounds like someone I ought to know."
Oh yeah. Prissy Bitch, meet Horologium Spy Queen of England. Horologium Spy English Queen, meet Prissy Bitch, was Charlotte's first thought, she even giggled to herself. "Hmm okay, I can see you and Olivia getting along," she said, before she couldn't resist adding, "Better you than me".
Turns out Charlotte could've used that offer of tutoring, as the following French Literature class soon left her sitting there without a clue what to answer with. She also winced when she saw that 'Margaret' in front of her didn't appear to have any trouble with her schoolwork, despite her being very much not French (unless you traced her line all the way back to William the Conqueror). Yes, Charlotte knew this was due to whichever Antikythera the tank princess was connected to doing all the translating for her… but it still stung being beaten at her own language by a Brit. She shuddered, for in her mind she could already hear Olivia yelling at her to study harder.
Then the second class ended, Charlotte had the chance to have the conversation with 'Margaret' she really wanted. "Hey, now we're out, can I talk with you in private?" she leaned forth and asked.
"Why, of course. Though truly, you didn't have to wait till now to ask," 'Margaret' said in return, a comment that didn't amuse Charlotte.
The two girls then headed into a janitor's closet at Charlotte's insistence, and before she said anything she first looked all around it, shoving buckets, mops, and crates aside, for any hidden cameras. She then turned around, looked her spy right in the eyes, and said, "Quit this charade, I know you and you know me. When you said 'embarrassed you earlier', you meant down in that base, didn't you, Queen Liz?"
"Queen?" 'Margaret Mayfair', or rather Elizabeth Windsor, took notice of out of everything Charlotte said, "I mean, that's what everyone says I went on to become. But truly, I've always known myself as a princess."
"What the-?" Charlotte muttered out, "Why would Horologium summon you from back when you were just a princess, when everyone knows you as Queen? Grr, I'm getting side-tracked," she clutched her head for a second, then said, "Look, don't think I don't know what you and Horologium are up to. If you think you can just sidle into my class and learn everything about me, well it won't work! I'm onto you."
Elizabeth then took a deep breath before she stated, "Miss Chretien, I was sent by my Horologium superiors to check up on you, make sure everything was alright. And naturally to finish my education too, I am but eighteen after all. Anyway, the 'incident', ahem, down in the base the other day could simply be chalked up to a misunderstanding between our organisation and you, albeit an unfortunate one. As things are now, we do not, I repeat, do not see you as our enemy."
Feh, I sure see you as mine! Charlotte had to do everything in her power to keep herself from outright saying that. You've been spying me and my town for God knows how long, Honoré's one of your card-carrying members, and not one but two Immortals know how full of shit you are- her train of thought came to a short stop. Wait, does this mean Horologium doesn't know about me meeting Octobriana? So has Pinocchio, God I can't believe I'm saying Pinocchio, has he not reported back to them yet? "What about Orlando coming to help me, that doesn't concern you?" Charlotte ended up asking, and that namedrop still chanced things a little.
Elizabeth hesitated on hearing that name, before she said, "More so for the fact that Orlando would go against us at all, than any connection she may share with you. Orlando was…" she paused, "Long in service of our British Royal Family, since her origins back in my namesake's time. I cannot fathom why… why she'd now raise her blade against us," she then had to hold back tears.
Oh, I don't know, maybe because you're now with some creepy spy organisation, or whatever Horologium really is, hmm? Charlotte thought. She was about to say that she'd only met up with Orlando (who now more obviously had no connection to the paladin of Charlemagne) one other time, but she then worried even that might be too much info for Horologium. So she said instead, "Hey, I never saw hide nor hair of this Orlando before you pulled out a friggin' tank that time, so don't go pinning this on me. But what I wanna know now is, what makes you so loyal to these Horologium people? What the hell are they doing for you?" Or Mum, or Honoré?
Elizabeth breathed deep, like she had quite the answer prepared. "I suppose you already know what a 'Future Psyche' is?"
"Yeah, yeah, they're like mental worlds based on what people think the future's gonna be," Charlotte said, and which apparently my own whole world is, info she was cautious about letting Elizabeth know she knew. "Your point?"
"As Horologium, our duty is to investigate and profile these Future Psyches, identify any threats they may pose, and use them to ensure humanity heads down the best possible future. As one with a duty to my own people's future, Horologium is my and many others' natural ally," Elizabeth professionally stated, before she more personally added, "Charlotte, please understand we are not your enemy, nor do we wish to be."
Charlotte didn't know what to say, was this really an offer of friendship after a bad first impression? Or are you just trying to make nice, when all Horologium wants is their Antikythera back? In fact, how do I know you yourself don't give a shit about me, and have just memorised some prepared script? "You still want my Antikythera though, don't you?" she asked, cutting to the chase.
"Well, yes. It'd be preferable to have it returned, especially since you appear to have got it off another Agent," Elizabeth said, but added, "Of course, we of Horologium have more than enough Antikythera on hand, so we could easily arrange your own personal one."
"And what about," Charlotte was going to say Yoshitsune, but then thought if his identity was still unknown she'd like to keep it that way, so finished, "what about the Remembered Dead I've already Summoned? What happens to him?"
"Even if you could recreate the scenario which called him," Elizabeth began, but hesitated before saying this next line, "Horologium would rather you didn't. From his appearance and actions at this Future Psyche's base, most likely you've summoned Minamoto no Yoshitsune."
Charlotte flinched. Huh, so much for secrecy, she thought on hearing Elizabeth say his name.
"He's a historical figure infamous for his disobedience and difficulty with authority, so you can see why we'd recommend you summon others. You of course have all of history and beyond to pick from," Elizabeth finished.
"What? Oh come on, Yoshitsune's never been anything but-" Charlotte protested but had to stop, was there some truth to what Elizabeth said? She recalled that reckless escape down the side of the base that Yoshitsune had pulled her into… Then again, I've been pretty reckless too, I did suggest that stupid 'boyfriend' thing, more 'cause I was lonely than anything.
Elizabeth checked the time, then said, "Oh, I do apologise, it appears I've kept you from your next class. Ah, my next class too, I am now a student here after all. Well Charlotte, I'll leave you to think matters over, but again, know we at Horologium do not wish you harm."
As Elizabeth left, Charlotte had to think, So how come everything with her tank doesn't count as 'wishing me harm'? Is she honestly gonna call that just an accident? Charlotte was also tempted to ask who'd summoned Elizabeth then, specifically if it'd been Honoré or even Olivia… but by now she had no faith she would've been given a proper answer. She'll probably say that's classified or whatever. And really, what evidence do I have to know Horologium really does have everyone's best interests at heart?
The school timetable continued until Drama Club rehearsals came around again, which Olivia was the Head of, in more ways than one Charlotte might add. While Olivia wasn't the sort of person normally taken for a Theatre Director, Charlotte knew from all the difficulties their production of Les Misérables had suffered last year, like how the barricade kept breaking apart, that she was no less uptight as one.
Last year had at least been under a completely different supervising teacher. The one they'd gotten this year was the school's English teacher, the Shakespearean-trained Mr. 'Drake Knight'. Stage name most likely, Charlotte had thought back then, and still now. With his tousled dark brown hair and old-fashioned coat, Knight towered over his students even more than an adult his age would. You could tell he was naturally dramatic from his preference of standing half in shadow.
"So, we are still all undecided over this year's production, hmm?" Knight asked as he gazed down at the Drama Club, "Because if we all can't agree soon enough, I shall have to step in and pick the play myself. I already have a classic in mind, Henry V."
That suggestion made his French students all wince. In response, Olivia was quick to step in and say, "Well, I believe the play that got the majority of the votes was Tartuffe, why don't we go with that?"
Charlotte had to smirk hearing someone like Olivia vouch for a play that roguish. Then again, suppose the shocking in the past is the normal in the present, she thought, as much as 'past', 'present', and 'future' still had meaning to her.
"Hey, least it beats Oedipus Rex," another student laughed with others joining in. Charlotte had to shrink back hearing those words, given that was unsurprisingly the play she'd suggested every past year. It could've only been worse had they worked in mentioning her fencing loss.
"Oh come on, I had something totally different in mind this time," she said, "Like, there's this Noh play I recently looked up, so I thought-"
"Sorry, but I'll have to veto that," Olivia said, "A Noh production may be too much of a stretch for us, especially given the plays we've previously performed. It might be more a university thing," she of course had to remind Charlotte that university exams were coming up.
"Yeah, but that's why we should do it, 'cause it's a real change of pace. Besides, they're real cheap too, don't need a lot of props or anything," Charlotte said.
"Might I ask why the class is honestly giving time to the suggestions of a stunt double?" Mr. Knight spoke up, having to remind Charlotte of her somewhat embarrassing role for the theatre, "Also, do you assume we are somehow broke? Yes, I was told of your production issues last year, but it seems to me that was mainly caused by your former teacher's budgeting, or lack thereof."
It wasn't just Charlotte who nearly froze up being singled out like this, Olivia too had to twitch at hearing all this be directed her friends' way, well for a given value of 'friend'. "Charlotte, could I ask a favour?" Olivia intervened, "Gaspard doesn't appear to have shown up yet. He's not sick or anything, I did meet with him earlier today, so perhaps you could help by looking for him?"
Not that Charlotte couldn't tell that Olivia's way of making her feel included was to basically shoo her out of the Club. Guess she's got a point though, it is weird Gaspard hasn't shown up, him being our lead actor. Whether or not he even deserves that role, but anyway, Charlotte thought, but just said, "Yeah, I'll go find him." It's not like my ideas were being appreciated here anyway.
She was then sent wandering the halls, finding not a trace of an otherwise quite popular student… until she heard what sounded like a sharp, stabbing noise coming from the courtyard. Charlotte's instinct was to run in the opposite direction on hearing, well, whatever that was, but she slowly steeled her nerves and headed out into the courtyard. But even that sound could not prepare her for what she saw…
There by the edge of the school, a group of students were now skewered on long spikes, murdered cold. Yoshitsune, at least more used to such wartime savagery than Charlotte, even out of nowhere, was already on the scene. "Lady Charlotte, I have no doubt this is Horologium's doing, who else would be behind this?" he said.
Charlotte could now make out these students more clearly, she even recognised a few from the crowd the day she first brought Yoshitsune to school. And impaled there in the centre of it all… was Gaspard.
"Elizabeth…" Charlotte then sneered, "This is your benevolent organisation? This is your people's idea of 'protecting the future'?!"
"No, this is our idea of combatting the disease before it can spread," creaked out an unknown voice. Charlotte span around to see it belonged to a man clad in a black coat, his skin so pale as to pass for a skeleton, his blond hair a stark platinum in contrast to Honoré's dirtier shade, he even carried an upturned scythe in each hand… which Charlotte wasn't sure how would work in a combat situation. Most crucially however was his own Antikythera replica attached to his arm. "I have no idea what our Princess Windsor said to you, but frankly I've no interest in niceties," this reaper man said.
Yoshitsune drew his sword, the same one he'd once under pressure lent to Charlotte, and barked, "So you're the one behind this?!"
"Haha, no. Much as my affinity is for the macabre, impaling students was my associate's bright idea, not mine," this near-skeleton Horologium Agent said, "Still, I'm forced to give him credit for such a tactic working so far. Point being, surrender your stolen Antikythera, little girl, or you'll be next on a spike."
At that moment the associate in question showed, bounding on his steed over the courtyard walls. He was a man clad in a black-and-crimson cloak and robes, carrying a bundle of spears like a multi-lance under his arm. He rode a skeletal horse that somehow stayed in one piece… and there was only a gaping hole where his head should be.
Not that he didn't have any head on him though, for atop his longest lance rested the decapitated head of someone both Charlotte and Yoshitsune knew. "O-Olivia!" Charlotte gasped seeing the class rep's head on that spike.
Yoshitsune, on seeing this head, called out a completely different name. "Benkei!"
It's probably time I get around to actually commenting her and it sure is an occasion. For a moment it actually looked like Elizabeth might have decent odds of working something on Charlotte by the magic of basic niceties, but Mister Stakes sure made clear what the risks are when working with Horologium.
On the note of Charlotte though, I'll say that I think you hit a good level of flawed with her. I mean, she's rough enough around the edges that I can't exactly call her the peak of likeability, but with all the problems she has to deal with herself she at least remains sympathetic.
Charlotte's actually a character I've had for quite a while, I first came up with her and her 'family' for a RP over a decade ago (her being partnered with Yoshitsune also comes from back then too). It was actually some YouTube comments about how real-life high school mean girls aren't as popular as fiction makes them out to be that got me thinking about her again
Charlotte stumbled for a moment, having heard Yoshitsune suddenly call out a name that wasn't Olivia's, even though that impaled head clearly was. But whether fear or confusion was induced, this headless horseman took the initiative either way to charge forth and trample upon Yoshitsune. The samurai howled in pain as the skeletal horse's hooves knocked him to the cobblestone ground, and only by rolling quickly out of the way did he avoid being skewered by a pike the horseman tried to bring down on top of him.
Yoshitsune tried to counter with a quick slash, but a slicing attack left no mark on the skeleton steed, having no flesh to tear. He had more luck with a second slash that cut through the rider's arm… only for a circle of what looked like ghostly nails to emerge from the blow to reconnect the horseman's severed limb.
Not that this horseman's Agent was simply standing idle, as he then tried to swing both his upturned scythes in a pincer movement at Charlotte. Not having even a prop sword on her at the time, Charlotte had to go on sheer instinct and punch this Agent right in the stomach, then followed that up with an elbow tackle a second later. While that did knock this Agent back a few feet, he still got a hit in as one of his scythes slashed down right by Charlotte, the pain from the bleeding slash right down her face left her shrieking.
Hearing his summoner cry out like that, and making hardly any progress against this headless horseman, Yoshitsune decided to dash forth, grab Charlotte, and then leap up with her right onto a nearby rooftop. "Lady Charlotte, I-I don't know if this will work," Yoshitsune had to of all things say once he and Charlotte were perched up high, "but that horseman should still be in range of my bow, and that Agent certainly."
The horseman however seemed to have another plan than finding some way to climb up the school walls. No, his idea was to drag a bundle of lances along the ground as the rode, his horse galloping faster and faster as they began to circle the school. Only then did their tactic become clear, as these lances then struck up a fire, the horseman evidently trying to surround the whole school in flames.
Her face still bleeding, the heat rising from the flames, Charlotte looked all over for any solution beyond one of Yoshitsune's arrows not getting burned up before it reached either rider or Agent. But it only took one swerve of her head for the answer to become obvious. "The belltower!" she whispered loudly, somehow, to Yoshitsune, she would've shouted that if not for the last-minute thought that the Agent or the horseman would've heard. "We can use it to warn everyone."
"Lady Charlotte, isn't your school prepared for fires? You did say they had special 'alarms' the other day," Yoshitsune brought up, recalling an incident where Charlotte had to tell him not to shoot one he'd mistaken for a spy camera. He followed with, "Besides, it should be within my capacity to leap over these flames and onto the other side."
"What, just jump over a friggin' inferno, are you insane?" Charlotte snapped, "Besides, my school sure doesn't have a 'Horologium alarm' or 'headless horseman alarm'. Now, either help me up there or I'll climb the tower myself!"
Yoshitsune sighed, Charlotte's words combined with the blood still running down her face sure had a way of getting to him. He then dashed and leapt with her up and through the belltower window, where Charlotte wasted no time in grabbing its rope and pulling. However, the sheer tolling of the bell from this close caused her whole self to shake, and crucially, the Antikythera she'd hidden on herself to start spinning… just like how it'd done before Yoshitsune was summoned.
A dazed and wounded Charlotte then stumbled and fell right out of the belltower. Yoshitsune would've rushed to save her… but then saw he didn't have to. A gleaming light burst forth from where Charlotte would've landed otherwise, and a second summoned figure then caught her in his arms.
And then was only able to hold Charlotte for a few seconds before her weight gave way and she fell onto the top of the triangular roof. Still, from here she at least got a better view of apparently the second Remembered Dead her Antikythera had happened to call. He was a scholarly-looking Middle Eastern man clad in long, oasis-green court robes, with a particularly high collar covering his neck. In one hand he carried what looked like a collection of scrolls, while in the other he held a staff nearly as tall as he was.
Given the unfavourable first impression he had made, having failed to help his summoner down properly, the second summoned Dead knelt on one knee before Charlotte, extended his hand and said, "Do forgive my moment of ineptitude, summoner. Know you have called upon the Grand Vizier Jafar, son of Yahya of the line of Barmaki." This Jafar then looked around to see what sort of situation he'd found himself into, a fire stranding his summoner and him on this building with people no less than impaled down below, then groaned, "Why am I not surprised I've been called on in a moment of crisis?"
Vizier? Jafar? Charlotte gawked, as unlike with Yoshitsune she actually recognised the name. But Yoshitsune brought up another thought, Crap, if I've summoned Jafar or whoever, does that mean I've lost Yoshitsune? Fortunately that immediately turned out to not be the case, as a still manifested Yoshitsune touched down right beside Charlotte. It made Charlotte suddenly recall something Elizabeth had said to her, that she could 'summon others', not just 'summon another'.
"Pleased to make your acquaintance, Lord Jafar. I'm Yoshitsune of the Minamoto clan and… yes, further introductions will have to wait," the samurai said and bowed in turn, maintaining his composure while smoke was rising all around him. "And with three of us now, I suppose making the leap with everyone out of here has now been, ahem, complicated."
"I'll say," Jafar replied, "I'd advise against such idiocy as leaping over a fire like this, any sane vizier would say the same."
Yoshitsune would've spoken back, but it turned out he didn't need to, as it was Charlotte who protested her new summon with, "Oh yeah, like you can come up with anything better!" This despite having shot down Yoshitsune's same offer earlier.
While this was going on, it seemed Charlotte's ringing of the bell had paid off. Its tolling had apparently alerted some sort of army truck, or 'army lorry' given its tell-tale British insignia. Whatever you called it, it skidded to a halt in front of the skeletal steed that headless horseman was seated on. While the horseman was able to quickly leap out of the way, the horse was broken apart by the impact, its bones being scattered all over.
Elizabeth, not a surprise given the last WW2 vehicle around was hers, leapt out of the lorry and marched straight over towards the Agent who'd summoned the horseman. "Agent Cryptkeeper, what is the meaning of this?" she demanded.
"Doing my duty," said the scythe-wielding summoner, Agent Cryptkeeper presumably, "Oh, I was informed of your attempt to persuade this girl, but really, what's a Good Cop routine without some Bad Cop pressure?"
Elizabeth was about to respond, but noticed the teachers were already running to try and extinguish the surrounding fire. Even then they were only able to do so much, it being obvious by now the fire department would have to be called, likely not anything that headless horseman would've dealt with back in his own time. That horseman, Cryptkeeper, and Elizabeth had to retreat into the nearby woods. Of course they would, Charlotte thought seeing them hide, if Horologium actually wanted to go public around here, they would've done so by now.
"I believe at least enough of the fire has been cleared that we may attempt to descend about, hmm," Jafar said then pointed with his staff, "right there."
"Feh, I could've easily figured that out on my own," Charlotte said, only to look down and see that even without the fire, it was still quite a drop from the roof. "Er, Yoshitsune, little help here?" she had to ask.
Charlotte and her two Summons had the luck to get to the ground without being spotted, if for not so lucky reasons. Anyone in the school currently not occupied with trying to douse the fire was staring up shocked at the sight of several students all impaled. Charlotte took the occasion to slip past them and further out into the forest, on track of the Dead who'd done the impaling. All the while she didn't even want to think how her school would handle Gaspard and Olivia both being dead, well, assuming Olivia even was dead, given Yoshitsune somehow didn't recognise that impaled head as Olivia's.
It wasn't long before they came upon a clearing where Elizabeth was now trying to take Cryptkeeper and his summoned headless horseman to task. Additionally, there was now another Remembered Dead by Cryptkeeper's side, one Charlotte could instantly tell was Pinocchio. Wait, did this Cryptkeeper guy also summon him? Charlotte thought. So, just how many can an Antikythera summon?
"Cryptkeeper, you like any other Agent should know we have means of restraining unruly Dead," Elizabeth scolded him, "Don't act like your failure to rein in Vlad the Impaler isn't on you."
Vlad the Impaler? As in, Vlad Dracula? Charlotte again thought. So this guy's no Dullahan or Sleepy Hollow thing? Granted, he certainly has the 'Impaler' part down… Also, when Elizabeth spoke of a 'means of restraining', Charlotte had to notice that Cryptkeeper's Antikythera had an extra attachment that hers didn't. Not that she had anything more than a hunch to know the two were connected.
"Oh sure, and then he would have killed me the first chance he got for daring to give him orders," Cryptkeeper said, with Vlad looking down at him and nodding, much as a headless horseman could 'nod'. "And if you're going to say, 'then just dismiss him', well…" Cryptkeeper flinched as he felt his own Remembered Dead's sword hovering near him.
"Pinocchio, can you confirm?" Elizabeth asked.
"You'd better, I didn't exhaust myself trying to wrench you out of that rebel woman's captivity for nothing," Cryptkeeper said to Pinocchio, Charlotte took it by 'rebel woman' he meant Octobriana. The wooden puppet sighed and repeated what Cryptkeeper had said, and sure enough, his nose didn't grow.
Unfortunately, if Charlotte thought she and her summons could just hide and watch behind the trees, they thought wrong. A single step on a loose leaf was enough for the Horologium Agents to all turn around and spot them. With their cover having been blown, it was Jafar who then strode up and said, "Well, now that we are in a conversational mood, might I ask just what your business is impaling, starting fires, and trying to murder my summoner?" Charlotte's mood sank as she realised that every explanation she gave Yoshitsune would need to be given to Jafar all over again.
"And don't think of sending that horseman on us this time," Yoshitsune said, drawing his sword, "I struck him with my Usumidori, the blade of my ancestor coated in the poison of a spider monster he slew. This 'Vlad' may have reattached himself, but I doubt such poison can be so simply cured".
Wait, you mean the sword you leant me that one time was poisoned? Charlotte thought, you'd better be bluffing…
"Try us," Cryptkeeper said back to Yoshitsune, "Medicine has come quite a long way since samurai days, especially for Horologium. Oh, right," he then said, feeling Vlad looming over him, "My Summon also prefers the term 'cephalophore'. He's the religious type, to put it mildly."
Elizabeth, trying to get things back on track, responded to Jafar's original questioning with, "We represent Horologium, an organisation dedicated to ensuring the brightest future. Ahem, most of us are anyway, I'm afraid our Agent Cryptkeeper here was a thankfully rare case of having a summoned Dead go awfully awry. I assure you, this is not at all consistent with standard Horologium procedure, and he and his Prince Vlad will be disciplined accordingly." Much as Elizabeth tried to insist this wasn't at all like Horologium, Charlotte had to notice she wasn't calling on Pinocchio to confirm.
"You still did not explain the original motive of Cryptkeeper here," Jafar reminded, which made Charlotte realise she hadn't told him yet. Or rather hadn't had time to.
"Simple. Your summoner here stole an Antikythera summoning device from one of our Officers, her own father too," Cryptkeeper said, "then used it to attack our base unprompted. We are simply trying to take back what's ours, it's just that Her Royal Highness here thought she could do so by asking nicely."
"Unprompted? You were spying on the whole town!" Charlotte said.
It was then the usually silent Vlad, if not silent by choice, took out a quill and wrote on a piece of parchment, 'Be grateful all we were doing was observation work, before your insolence made us force our hand. Had we chosen so, our authority would've let us employ far harsher measures'.
Vlad really not helping her case, Elizabeth then tried to insist, "O-our 'spying' was for your Future Psyche's own safety! And for our present day's own safety too, to confirm your world is not a threat." Again, no asking Pinocchio to confirm.
"What, just how could my world be a threat?" Charlotte demanded.
"Your 'world'? You speak as if we aren't even on Earth," Jafar said.
"No, I believe we're on Earth alright, if an Earth that I'm told exists in the mind," Yoshitsune said, "the question is what kind of Earth."
Pinocchio sighed and asked, "Do I really have to explain?" When Elizabeth gave the nod, despite not being his summoner (not that Crypt-keeper cared), Pinocchio then said, "They say this future world is 'post-apocalypse'. I mean, they told me in my village that the apocalypse would one day come from God and the Devil fighting, but now they tell me this apocalypse is because of some new disaster called 'nuclear fallout'. But at least your world's now had long enough since then to get back to normal."
Charlotte went pale, unable to believe what she'd just heard. Yet sure enough, Pinocchio's nose stayed where it was. Wait, Octobriana said those tunnels were 'evidence' of my world being a Future Psyche. So they would've been used as fallout shelters then? No, if this really is a post-apocalyptic future, why haven't I seen more wastelands, toxic mires, blown-up buildings, stuff like that?
"The assumption is this wooden automaton can determine the truth, I take it?" Jafar then asked.
"What? Oh, it's more if he lies, his nose will grow, 'cause of a fairy or something," Charlotte said.
"A 'fairy'? You assume I would be convinced by sinful little superstitions like that?" Jafar then said, "No, unless I have proof this puppet was animated by a peri or djinn or whichever, I will assume he's but an intricate mechanism. Those I actually have seen with my own eyes."
"…But my nose was enchanted by a fairy," Pinocchio tried to say, but even with his nose not growing Jafar still ignored him.
"Forgive me summoner, I've gotten side-tracked," Jafar continued, "What I meant to call attention to was the puppet's use of language. 'They say', 'they tell me', ergo he may be speaking the truth only so far as he's aware, not the truth. My point is, do not take this 'Future Psyche' babbling for granted until the evidence tells you for certain."
Charlotte wanted to say that Octobriana, most certainly not with Horologium, had told her the same thing. Yet she couldn't tell him while still in earshot of actual Horologium members, lest it just give Vlad an excuse to ramp up his brutality… not that he needed one.
"Tell me, why does Lady Charlotte's father, that is Honoré Chretien," Yoshitsune asked, correcting himself in Charlotte's presence, "why does he simply not retrieve his Antikythera himself?"
Cryptkeeper chuckled, "Why would an Officer waste time on what they could simply get some Agents to do?"
"I'd also imagine it's because an esteemed Officer would not simply thoughtlessly yank as prized an item as an Antikythera off his own daughter," Elizabeth said.
"Wow, you really don't know Honoré, do you?" Charlotte said, which made Elizabeth twitch in response, "Can't believe I'm saying this, but I'd have to take this 'Cryptkeeper' guy's word on this one."
Elizabeth's attempt at a peace-talk between Horologium and this ad hoc resistance may have gone on too long, as everyone could hear people from the school running up to find them. "Quickly, back to base!" Elizabeth ordered Cryptkeeper and his two summons, regardless of whether she had the authority to do so.
"Vlad, hear her out. You'd at least know the tactical value of striking then retreating," Crypt-keeper tried to get through to his more unruly Dead, before he was able to activate some sort of electronic command that teleported him and his two Dead away.
"Er, still don't see how being an accomplice in impalement and arson is being 'moral'…" Pinocchio had to remark as he faded into the warp.
Charlotte then looked at Jafar and went, "Sheesh, we haven't got an alibi for you yet. Quick, hide!" On instinct, she then pushed him right into the bushes. Jafar would've protested, but already Charlotte's schoolmates had shown up.
"Charlotte!" an awfully familiar voice cried, with Charlotte almost fainting when she saw it belonged to none other than Olivia.
"B-but how… Olivia, I-" Charlotte struggled to say, "I thought you were- you'd been-"
"She's delirious from the fire," Elizabeth swooped in to cover for Charlotte, even if this wasn't cover Charlotte exactly appreciated.
At first, Olivia reached out and hugged Charlotte, but the Class Rep then had to say, "I-I know you didn't do, do that to Gaspard, there's simply no way you could have. But look me in the eye and say with total honesty that you did not start this fire."
"Of course I didn't, it was that Impaler!" Charlotte said.
"She did," Elizabeth however then told Olivia right to her face.
Those words nearly broke Charlotte, if not for Yoshitsune, or 'Gikei' here, stepping in to say, "That's a lie, I was there when the Impaler tried to scorch the earth."
"It was in self-defence," Elizabeth then softened said lie, "but still, I can confirm Charlotte committed this arson."
"Oh come on, who are you gonna believe, me or her?" Charlotte blurted out. Only to recall Olivia's growing distrust of her, and that she'd never once trusted Yoshitsune… "Er, s-she said it was self-defence!"
Olivia's breath then slowed as her grip on Charlotte tightened like iron. She then hissed, "Charlotte… why am I wasting my time on you? What made me even think I could do anything to help you?!"
-Charlotte has been destroying security cameras around town, to make sure Horologium isn't watching them. This has been noticed.
-Elizabeth Windsor is now attending Charlotte's school.
-The reason that the Future Psyche is a Future Psyche is apparently because of a nuclear war/detonation far in the past, long enough for the world to have recovered. With this information in mind, the tunnels below the town are the leftovers from fallout shelters. However, Charlotte does not quite believe it, due to there being no evidence of any disaster, even though both Octobriana and Pinocchio stated this.
Horologium Associates:
Agent Cryptkeeper: A skeletal-like Horologium agent working with Vlad the Impaler. He refuses to force or dismiss Vlad due to threats of violence from the Remembered Dead. Went against Elizabeth II's orders in order to play 'Bad Cop' and put pressure on Charlotte.
Remembered Dead:
Pinocchio: A puppet Remembered Dead straight from fiction. Much like his legend, his nose grows whenever he lies, such as when he was asked if he knew what Horologium was. He is being used as a way for Horologium to confirm truths.
Vlad the Impaler: A Remembered Dead working under a near-skeletal Horologium agent. A true 'Headless Horseman' upon a skeletal horse, wielding a long spear, though he prefers to be called a 'cephalophore.' A head impaled on one of his many spears, the longest specifically, somehow takes the form of both Olivia and Benkei.
Jafar: A Remembered Dead summoned by Charlotte. He appeared and (sort of) saved Charlotte from falling from the belltower, though he immediately dropped her after. Charlotte recognizes him, and he seems somewhat irritated to be summoned in a chaotic situation.
Er no, no he's not, I think I could've been clearer. Pinocchio was talking about what the people in his 19th century Italian village thought the apocalypse was going to be, based on the Bible and before the invention of nuclear weapons. I went back and edited the chapter to make his phrasing more precise. Not that the Biblical apocalypse couldn't form the basis of another Future Psyche
Er no, no he's not, I think I could've been clearer. Pinocchio was talking about what the people in his 19th century Italian village thought the apocalypse was going to be, based on the Bible and before the invention of nuclear weapons. I went back and edited the chapter to make his phrasing more precise. Not that the Biblical apocalypse couldn't form the basis of another Future Psyche
I mean, they told me in my village that the apocalypse would one day come from to God and the Devil fighting, but now they tell me this apocalypse is because of some new disaster called 'nuclear fallout'.
Ah, probably a leftover from what I originally wrote, that's fixed now. Only other correction that comes to mind is that Cryptkeeper's more 'skeletal-like' or 'near skeletal' than literally skeletal. Other than that, all good!
On another topic, I once said Charlotte was from a roleplay way back in the day. I should also say that scene with Yoshitsune back in Chapter 4, with him meditating under a tree before cutting down the leaves, was also taken from what someone else wrote for that roleplay, even if it's a fairly stock samurai scene (I've considered changing that scene to him playing his flute, to better lead into the start of Chapter 5).
Reasons I don't link to that roleplay is the site it was on would've probably deleted it, and I was also pretty young when I tried running it, so it unsurprisingly went pretty poorly
Update: Yep, went back and checked, the old RPG's long been deleted
Ah, probably a leftover from what I originally wrote, that's fixed now. Only other correction that comes to mind is that Cryptkeeper's more 'skeletal-like' or 'near skeletal' than literally skeletal. Other than that, all good!
On another topic, I once said Charlotte was from a roleplay way back in the day. I should also say that scene with Yoshitsune back in Chapter 4, with him meditating under a tree before cutting down the leaves, was also taken from what someone else for that roleplay, even if it's a fairly stock samurai scene (I've considered changing that scene to him playing his flute, to better lead into the start of Chapter 5).
Reasons I don't link to that roleplay is the site it was on would've probably deleted it, and I was also pretty young when I tried running it, so it unsurprisingly went pretty poorly
I was gonna say I meant to put 'did', but I now think 'wrote' is a more precise word, since well, they wrote it
Also, one of my little worries about the last update was it having maybe a few too many characters (seven) at once, might've made the scene a little cluttered. Though I think I handled the scene well, given that issue
I've also been thinking of running a Revalkyrie spin-off Quest for publicity and promotional reasons, but it might be better to wait until more of Revalkyrie's been written before that
At least one person who appeared to be having quite the good school day was someone quite close to Charlotte, well close biologically anyway. All the way over in the city of Auxarliar, Etienne Vernier walked out of the vine-strewn private school he went to with a smile on his face. Any student his age would too, had they gotten his same high scores on today's practice exam for le baccalaureat; not that the thought of facing the actual test was any less shudder-inducing for him.
He was familiar with those scenes in American movies where the smart kids would get picked on, but that'd never been true for him, though it may've helped he was also an athlete. In fact, his walk home was delayed by several of his fellow students coming up to cheerfully ask him things like, "Hey, since you're one of the best on our football team, you're totally gonna go pro once you graduate, huh?" "Etienne, can you help me with my homework? My grades are nowhere near as good as yours." "So, doing anything interesting tonight? Someone like you's gotta have something planned." He nodded and tried to respond to all of these, even if they all started to blur in his head after a while.
Auxarliar was a larger town, proper city arguably, than Etoile de Sant-Michel was, with the river that ran right through the town centre being far wider than the one that snaked across Sant-Michel. Well, so Etienne had been told, him having been but a child the last time he was in Sant-Michel, and that age its meagre river sure seemed mighty to him. Anyway, Auxarliar also stood out for its cathedral spires, which Etienne had regularly been told were 'unshakeable' though he had no idea what local calamity threatened to topple them in the first place. But even those spires paled in comparison to Auxarliar's hilltop Citadel, the site of one too many of Etienne's old field trips.
It'd still be obvious to someone who'd somehow met both Charlotte and Etienne these days that he was her brother, in appearance if not mannerisms. He was around her height, although nobody would describe him as 'gangly' like they would her, and had the same shade of brown hair and amber eyes she did. As you'd expect, his expression by far was the biggest difference, with him often being able to give out a smile or at least stay pleasantly neutral.
Etienne soon reached the three-storey, Second Empire-style house he called home. Back when he was a kid, he thought it was the most amazing house in the world. Nowadays well, he tried not to bring it up in conversation much, it being another thing that set him above and apart from everyone else. He found his mother already out on the doorstep, her looking about to go out given the umbrella in her hand combined with the grey clouds overhead. What didn't add up was that if she had Horologium business, she could just use the teleporter in the basement and leave Etienne a note, like she'd done before.
Trying to start this conversation off normal before he inquired deeper, Etienne smiled, held up his photocopied papers and said, "Look Mum, I got top marks on the test! I mean, it's not le bac proper, but it's still something."
"Oh, that's wonderful, dear," Danielle smiled, "I may have been a bit excessive with putting you through all that extra tutoring, but looks like it paid off." By 'extra tutoring', she meant how she'd summon various Remembered Dead over the years to give Etienne further lessons, with them spanning the length of time of Aristotle all the way to Carl Sagan. Not that getting lessons from the likes of Aristotle in the modern day had worked out… particularly well, but at least Etienne could say he no joke shared a teacher with Alexander the Great. Well, emphasis on could, given the inherent issues with just telling people that Remembered Dead were a thing.
"But anyway, what's the occasion?" Etienne then asked, "You usually just a leave a note and use your teleporter when you've got stuff to do for Horologium."
Danielle laughed at that and said, "Really, can't a working woman just go out and about on town as she pleases? I'm simply heading to a restaurant, noted for its wine but which restaurant isn't around here, to meet up with some friends and colleagues. You know, Immortals like Glinda the Good Witch or the fox Kuzunoha." To think those words would've been a joke coming from anyone else's mouth.
"Oh no, I wasn't saying you couldn't," Etienne said, despite his mother's lack of any real offence, "It's more that you going out for leisure just, well, isn't really something you do anymore."
"Ah, I know what you mean there," Danielle said as she slumped a little, "I thought things were quieting down a little in this- ahem, in the particular Future Psyche I have jurisdiction over," she suddenly adopted a defensive tone, "but no, insurgent activity has subsequently shot up, and with it my paperwork. Still, least I've managed to squeeze in some time off."
Like always, Etienne was tempted to ask just what Horologium was exactly, but backed down knowing that nothing even an Officer like his mother said would clarify things. It wasn't that he'd never gotten an answer, if anything the problem was he'd gotten too many answers over the years, being told Horologium was everything from a research institute to a surveillance group to a defence operation, without any of these being narrowed down. Then again, you could say an organisation as big as Horologium was said to be would fill multiple roles at once, but one of those had to be its main role, right?
Instead, Etienne just said, "Hey, great for you. Guess I'll leave you to the food, wine, and co-workers, sounds like you could use every minute."
"Ah, one last thing. I do have a few Remembered Dead summoned right now in the house, but nobody you need to worry about. Charles, that is Baudelaire, is currently crashed and blackout drunk on the couch, while Sleeping Beauty's the one awake of all people. I actually asked Luisa to come with me on this meetup, but she was too busy with her exotic pets, they're not quite the easiest to handle. I won't be back till late at night, but I'll try to save you some food, you've earned it after that exam," Danielle went over. "Well, au revoir!"
Etienne returned his mother's goodbye, then stepped inside the house and set to unpacking. Or rather, he would have, had he not noticed that the stairs leading down to the basement had been left unclosed and exposed. He turned back around to let his mum know, but by now there was no sight of her.
Out of the Dead currently summoned here, Baudelaire was again drunk, alcohol probably being one of the softer substances he'd taken, Luisa Casati was occupied with a most mangy menagerie, and Dornroschen the Sleeping Beauty was, natch, a fairy-tale princess, so not what you'd call the most formidable sort. There really was nobody to stop him from heading down there, with his mother's personal base being somewhere he of course knew about but had rarely ever been in.
At first, he tried to step away, resist the temptation to look down there and take advantage of his mother being out… but he just couldn't help himself. He walked all the way down to that eerie green computer lab of sorts and found two objects of note. The first was a mannequin of a girl around his age, his hair colour too, which he tried not to think about right now since it may have been one of the Dead's. The second was none other than an Antikythera mechanism sitting right there, unlocked and unguarded.
His hands trembled as he reached towards the Antikythera, but he stopped just before he could take it. No matter how tempting the offer was, no matter how long he dreamt about summoning Remembered Dead on his own, Etienne just couldn't bring himself to take his mother's mechanism. Granted, there was the possibility that it being left right out in the open like this, the stairs not even being hidden, meant that his mother genuinely intended for him to take this Antikythera. But no, that was definitely something he ought to confirm first. Which could be done with a call, but… he couldn't. For something as momentous as this, better to ask in person.
A closer look at the Antikythera showed that not taking it may've been the right call all along, since not only was the paintjob off from what was standard, but there was even a kind of electric pad attached down the back, likely to give any would-be thieves a quick shock. So it seemed Etienne dodged a bullet, or at least a nasty jolt, in not stealing what had really been a decoy this whole time, but that still left a question hanging. Had this been one big mix-up, or had his mother arranged all this as part of some secret test?
Charlotte, after what felt like forever, was finally let go from the School Director's office, where she naturally found Yoshitsune waiting for her.
"I must confess, you were held in there for so long I considered breaking in and pulling you out," he opened by saying, but then sheathed his pale green sword, "but you've been let go anyway, so it seems my plans were for nought. Which might be for the best, I could've risked shattering your standing here further."
"Feh, my rep's shattered enough 'round here as it is," Charlotte shrugged and said, "and 'let go'? Pfft, for the rest of today maybe, but I've been saddled with detention. Indefinitely." With her first summon unlikely to know what that was, she added, "It means I'm stuck here every day after school, doing some bullshit like writing up apologies or work the janitor's too lazy for. Still, if it weren't for the fact that they couldn't find any conclusive evidence I started the fire, and yeah, also thanks to Elizabeth's line about 'self-defence'," she strained to admit, "I'd have been expelled, and then Honoré definitely would've found out about our whole operation."
"I see," said Yoshitsune, an oddly relieved expression on his face, "Oh sorry, it's just that my instincts feared you've been dealt a fate far worse. Discipline and punishment within our armies were, well, I'll spare you the grisly details and say they went much further than extended confinement."
"My instincts too," the new summon, Grand Vizier Jafar chimed in as he walked up, a whole stack of library books now in his hands, "Granted, even punishments in our Caliphate were relatively more humane than the backwards brutality of Europe… which, ahem, I realise is where I am now. Not that I couldn't tell from the flora and climate, but it never hurts to doublecheck. Near dear Charlemagne's heartland, no less."
"'Dear Charlemagne'? Didn't you call Europe backwards a second ago?" Charlotte asked, eyes narrowed.
"Well, sometimes you have to give credit where it's due," Jafar said, "His knights were fanatical ruffians, true, but the emperor himself was never anything less than a gentleman. The Roman Empress Irene though, she was an admittedly more complicated figure."
From what she'd been taught in History, Charlotte may once have agreed with Jafar's assessment. Having since learned about Charlemagne's Verdun massacre in her own time… less so these days. Then again, she took it Jafar would've only had the chance to see the emperor's good side- Wait, I'm talking with a guy who knew freakin' Charlemagne, from more than a millennium ago, why am I acting so nonchalant about this? Oh yeah, 'cause of everything else that's been going on, that's why.Wait a sec, Charlemagne and Rome- oh right, he means the Byzantines. "Guess if Horologium summons Charlemagne on us, maybe we can count on you to start up a peace-talk?" she figured.
"Ah yes, Horologium. From what I gathered from our encounter in the woods, they are an armed surveillance organisation who use advanced technology to summon the dead. Your father, 'Honoré', is one of their Officers, whose summoning device you stole, hence why they're after you. Have I understood the situation?" Jafar asked.
"Eh, you got the broad details right," Charlotte said, "Bunch of us going around smashing security cameras, oh, and that we met up with two Immortals, Orlando and Octobriana, who are also fighting Horologium."
Not that Jafar had had the chance to learn either of these things, but he nodded anyway. "All good. Now tell me, what reason do I have to not immediately hand you over to Horologium?" he asked. "True, what little I've seen of them has hardly been flattering, but it would help de-escalate tensions, no?"
Charlotte gasped. "Y-you can't do that! You can't… b-b-because" she was now working up a sweat. "Yoshitsune, help me out here!"
The samurai sighed. "Lady Charlotte, I ashamed to say that, were I summoned by a Horologium Agent, I… I would have gone along with the organisation. I spent my last days as an outlaw, I would've done anything to regain the trust of the authorities."
Those words left Charlotte half quaking with fright, half on the edge of tears, with the thought that Yoshitsune would seriously go along with Jafar's proposition.
"However," Yoshitsune then said, "it is too late for that, with the Lady Charlotte and I now firmly branded as enemies of Horologium. In my last days, I took my own life rather than face the certainty of capture, for I knew that an even worse execution only awaited me at the hands of my br- my enemy. Now, Horologium sends out whole war-machines against a couple of intruders and would burn down a civilian building, 'abnormal' as it supposedly is for them. Lord Barmaki, handing over the Lady Charlotte would only mean sending her to her death, and you and I along with her. Besides, if Benkei were here, he'd never let me live it down."
A long sigh of relief was let out by Charlotte, with the reassurance that one of her Summons was still on her side. Again with this 'Benkei' guy though, I gotta get around to asking 'bout him sometime.
Jafar snarled at what Yoshitsune said. "You committed suicide? How disgraceful, had our Charlotte not summoned you, God surely would've condemned you to the foulest pit of Jahannam."
Come on, the guy was surrounded by enemies! Aren't you overreacting? was a flinching Charlotte's first thought. Besides I... but that was a memory she didn't want to bring back up.
"Still," Jafar had to admit, "you do speak with conviction. And this Charlotte is our summoner, so I can see how giving her to Horologium would mean giving ourselves to Horologium. We know too little about them to know what they'd do with us, but nothing so far has suggested anything positive. My apologies, I was trying to keep our options open, but I may have spoken too rashly, my summoner," he then turned to Charlotte.
"I'll say," Charlotte gritted her teeth. "Seriously, is just handing the person who brought you here over to the enemy your answer to everything?!"
"I only meant to act as a Vizier should, assessing the situation by weighing up the pros and cons. Believe me, I've been called to make much more challenging decisions in my lifetime," Jafar said, before he looked back at Yoshitsune and went on, "By the way, while I was in this school's library, hardly Baghdad's House of Wisdom but it'll do in a pinch, I tried gathering all the info on Japanese History I could. Unsurprisingly I found little, your country being on the other end of Eurasia entirely, and what I found spoke mostly of figures long after your time. But I did find one concerning factoid on you, Minamoto, theorising you'd fled your death to become a certain Genghis Khan." Had any liquid been in her mouth, Charlotte would've done an instant spit-take on hearing her Yoshitsune having anything to do with Genghis Khan.
However, Yoshitsune shook his head and said, "I have never heard that name, and know for certain I escaped no death. That I can prove right here and now." Yoshitsune then disrobed his top half to show, right near his stomach, that he had… a sword blade jammed right into his skin. "This is my 'other' sword, the Imanotsurugi, the blade I stabbed myself with." Charlotte nearly fainted on being shown that Yoshitsune had been running around with a sword stuck in him all this time.
Jafar however didn't flinch at all, and even said, "I'm not surprised. I… too have a certain mark on my body showing the sign of my death, a 'Deathmark' you could say," he then let down his collar to show that his own head needed a ring of melted gold and paper bindings to remain attached to his neck. "The same goes for this 'Vlad the Impaler' of ours. I managed to find significantly more information on him, saying he was killed by dismemberment and his head was hoisted up for all Constantinople to see, all of which fits his visage as a Remembered Dead. This Vlad was a self-proclaimed enemy of Islam though, so I'm hardly tempted to mourn."
"Huh, and they say Elizabeth II just died of old age, so that explains why she's got no gross 'deathmark' on her. Then again, she's been summoned from her princess days anyway," Charlotte mused. I guess ghosts in horror stories tend to have some sign of their death on them, like spectral burns or detached heads, so icky as this is, it kinda makes sense, she thought. "So, er, what was point of bringing up Genghis Khan anyway?"
"I was getting to that," Jafar said, "Indeed, the source mentions the Yoshitsune-Genghis Khan claim has gone unsubstantiated and unsupported, and now our Minamoto has debunked it in person. I brought it up as, if you had been Genghis Khan," he looked right at Yoshitsune, "I would've started plotting your death immediately. For I also learned the Khan's people, the Mongols, did something unforgivable to Baghdad. I mentioned the House of Wisdom before, one of the greatest institutions of knowledge and learning in the world…" he then almost broke down, "All of it gone, burnt to ashes by a Mongol invasion. True, they say Genghis' grandson Hulagu is to blame, but I doubt this is a case where the apple fell far from the tree."
Yoshitsune took a while to respond after witness Jafar's near breakdown, but he then said, "I know next to nothing about your Caliphate, but… I think I see where you're coming from. If someone took every sutra, every poem, every historic chronicle, all of The Tale of Genji, and just burned it every last scroll, I'd react the exact same way."
Charlotte only knew Baghdad from modern reports, which didn't paint the most positive picture. But still, she knew anger and sorrow when she saw it, that feeling when your whole world had been wiped away. For a while she felt staying silent was the most courteous thing to do, but soon enough she chanced lightening the mood with, "Hey Jafar, y'know you could've found all this info on the town's Intranet without having to rummage through a whole bunch of books, right?"
"The handwritten word is what I'm most comfortable with," Jafar said simply.
"…Your advanced scientific mind couldn't figure out how to operate a computer, could you?" Charlotte smirked, which made Jafar bite his lower lip. Though saying it conjured the distressing thought that, if old people hard a hard enough time figuring out computers, how difficult would it be to teach someone from over a thousand years ago?
Pleasant dreams weren't something Charlotte was that used to in her life, and whenever she did have one, it'd be reduced to at best bittersweet the moment she woke up and had to contrast it with her life. The thought of ever keeping a dream diary depressed her. However, she wouldn't on the flipside say that she'd had that many notable nightmares in her life. That is, until now.
She'd waken up screaming and sweating in the middle of the night, having only been able to dream about stake after stake, impaled body after body, most of them piercing right into her stomach like that sword stuck in Yoshitsune. Speaking of Yoshitsune, she half-expected him to draw his sword as a reaction to the possibility an enemy had broken in, with it having been his shift that hour for keeping an eye out for Honoré or other agents. But no, he took Charlotte suddenly screaming herself awake like it was the most natural thing ever.
"Bad dream, Lady Charlotte?" he picked up on. "If I may be so bold to ask, was it, ahem, of the impalements at your school?"
Charlotte twitched. "Y-yeah, but how did you know?" she asked while giving him a side eye.
"Because I've had a fair few similar dreams," he said, "Not of impalement specifically, but of battlefield carnage. Reliving the deaths of friend and foe in my mind over and over again, they're not something you can simply block out."
"Well, aren't you ominous?" Charlotte grumbled. Would it help if I'd been born in a less 'comfortable' age like Medieval Europe, when butchery like that was all the rage? She kept that thought to herself, but that wasn't at all like what Yoshitsune responded with.
"Lady Charlotte, I do not say such things to frighten you. Simply that are if you are haunted by the brutality and bloodshed you've witnessed, know that you aren't alone. It's something all warriors go through, and truly, if there was a warrior not haunted by such carnage, I'd be highly suspicious of him," Yoshitsune said.
Well, I know how he's just trying to make me feel better, but… Charlotte sighed as she thought, 'Warrior', me? Er, I guess I am now, given that I'm fighting Horologium. I don't know why I'm fighting Horologium, well okay I do know, 'cause they spy on everyone, killed my classmates and tried to kill me. But I barely know anything about them. Anyway, how Yoshitsune talked about me, he made me and him sound like Vietnam vets or something. "'Spose you'd have it worse. I mean, you actually died once, that's gotta be haunting you way more than me seeing-" Charlotte began, but finished that last part in her head, than me seeing my classmates impaled.
Yoshitsune nodded. "You are right, every dream I've had since being summoned has been of how I met my death at Koromogawa, how could they be about anything else?" he said, his normally composed posture starting to tremble, "Not just my death, the death of the woman forced to marry me, the deaths of my family, the death of Benkei defending me."
"Benkei? Ah, you mean that guy you thought you saw on Vlad's stake?" Charlotte asked maybe too impetuously, "Actually, been meaning to ask you about him."
"Oh why, I could spend hours talking about him! Which may not be the wisest thing in the middle of the night," Yoshitsune let out a chuckle, "For now I'll just say he was my personal retainer throughout, hmm, almost every battle I ever had. In fact, it's…" he then paused, "strange for me, going for this long without him."
"Might I ask why you two are talking?" Jafar asked as he stirred awake from sleeping against the wall, his lookout shift earlier that night. "Do you honestly want to alert this Honoré that we're here?"
"What? Course he won't, like we're seriously talking that loud that he'd hear us downstairs-" Charlotte said at first, before she became aware of her own voice's volume. And glancing down, also remembered the cracks in her attic floorboards from the other night.
"The Lady Charlotte was just awaking from a nightmare, that's all. A nightmare entirely normal for one thrust into war to have," Yoshitsune told him.
"We are calling this a 'war' now?" Jafar had to ask, "Monstrous as that Vlad was, this whole situation more reminds me of a misunderstanding-fuelled scuffle. Yes yes, I am familiar with reports detailing battlefield stress, but I assure you that, if you are fighting a truly righteous war, you need not pay heed to such nightmares."
'Righteous war', like what? Imperial expansion, huh? Charlotte thought, having to hold back from starting an argument with her second Summon. She would've announced to everyone she was going back to sleep, but it then turned out she no longer really needed to, as it was then the morning sun shot its first rays. "Might as well stay up now, with detention eating up my time I gotta make use of all the daylight hours I have," she groggily mumbled, though a yawn still escaped her.
As Charlotte slowly got on with her morning routine, her ears picked up Jafar making a comment on her home, or more her house given how she felt about it. "I must admit, as a scion of the Barmaki I am accustomed to more… lavish dwellings, but I suppose it can't be helped. Harun, my Caliph, would've already seized all the Barmaki manors and property… more than a thousand years ago now," the former vizier said. His tone however did pick up with, "Still, to give our current nemesis his due, I can certainly commend a household sufficiently stocked with books. I suppose I've no choice but to adjust to more modest abodes- Ah, Charlotte. My apologies if I have demeaned you."
"Pfft, you can say whatever you want about Honoré's house, I don't mind. It's only my home 'cause nowhere else is," Charlotte said with her toothbrush still her mouth, but then had to add, "Well, anything except complimenting Honoré. Like he reads all these books anyway."
"Lady Charlotte, much as I myself would hesitate to bear my blade down on my summoner's father," Yoshitsune somewhat suspiciously said, "It's beginning to sound like you wouldn't mind if we simply, ahem, disposed of Honoré."
That testing of the waters only produced a shark-like grin from Charlotte. "Yeah, course I wouldn't mind. In fact, I would've even asked you that myself, but lucky me you brought it up first," she said.
"Minamoto, I'd advise you ignore such bravado," Jafar said, "Even if we assume our summoner isn't speaking on impulse, I'm afraid simply murdering this Honoré Chretien is tactical foolishness. We know Horologium already has more than one eye on us, all killing an Officer of theirs would accomplish would be to aggravate them even more. We do not need them thinking of us as a higher priority."
Feeling like there was some non-existent spotlight on her, Charlotte struggled before she said, "Yeah, I-I knew that. Well, doesn't matter, 'cause I have this back-up plan for now, okay? Except that if it goes as planned… we might need to move you guys somewhere else. So yeah, don't get too attached to Honoré's place."
"You already have a plan of action in mind, Lady Charlotte?" Yoshitsune asked, voice rising.
"A little too on the fly, for my liking," Jafar said, tone deflating, "But still, let's hear it."
"Okay, you remember Olivia, right? You see," Charlotte began but then winced, "I was gonna nut up and ask if she'd help me study, but at her house, that's the thing. If I can get in there, I think I can finally confirm whether she's working for Horologium. And hey, since Olivia's on good terms with the staff, if I'm lucky it'll count as my detention for the day, that way I'm not stuck studying through the night."
"I fail to see why this requires us to relocate our base of operations," Jafar said.
"I was getting to that!" Charlotte said, "You see, if Olivia isn't with Horologium, then I was gonna warn her of them. Thing is, knowing her she'll demand proof they exist, so that's when I summon another Remembered Dead right then and there to show her. All I gotta do is spin the Antikythera clockwise, I've got that down. On the other hand, if she is with Horologium, I might need an extra summon for my own protection."
"If this girl isn't with Horologium, then summoning in front of her would be the worst course of action," Jafar spoke out, "Most likely, you would only end up making her a target."
"Yeah right, you think they'd care? Gaspard knew nothing about Horologium," Charlotte said, even if she had no evidence either way for that, "but that didn't stop them from impaling him. Horologium want to stay a secret, that's how they operate," she went on assumption, "but I can take that away from them by warning anyone I can!"
Jafar at first said nothing, just groaned and threw up his hands. "I see Charlemagne taught his people nothing about practicality," he then muttered.
Yoshitsune however asked, "Lady Charlotte, is there a reason why, in that case, you don't use the Antikythera to summon an entire army, or at least more than just another summon?"
"Duh, 'cause I've got no idea how many this thing can summon," Charlotte said, "Like, after this next one I could be fresh out, for all I know. Besides, you've also gotta factor in the whole getting them used to the modern world- er, future world, that thing," she added, "guess you two guys have been pretty good about it, you've smiled and nodded at least. But how I can tell if more Dead are gonna adapt that easily? It could take forever to teach them, and that's if they don't go panic mode and start wrecking the place. So yeah, not exactly liking the idea of having a ton of new summons to corral."
"Well there is something to be said for commandeering a more compact and manoeuvrable select force," Yoshitsune said.
"…You were the one who suggested the whole army idea in the first place," Jafar said under his breath.
"Okay, so we're all on board with the plan? Good, 'cause I'll need you guys to be waiting outside in case," Charlotte paused before she admitted this next part, "anything goes awry. Oh, while we're talking, one question Yoshitsune," she then asked, "…that sword of yours. Usumidori, right? You said to Vlad that it had spider poison on it, didn't you?"
"You mean to tell me you leant a girl you just met a poisoned blade?" Jafar asked at Yoshitsune.
Yoshitsune sighed. "Lady Charlotte, again you had nothing to defend yourself with back in that base, my bow was out as you have no archery experience. Besides, I don't see why the poison should be an issue, a trained fencer like you wasn't going to thoughtlessly lick the blade, after all," he said.
"Yeah but, y'know, you could've warned me first," Charlotte mumbled. "Hey, that was days ago now, so we oughta-" but she was interrupted when she heard steps coming her way. The two Remembered Dead needed no prompting to hide, Jafar behind a bookcase and Yoshitsune around a corridor.
The usually absent Honoré then strode right up to Charlotte and asked, "I believe I heard something. I trust my ears do not deceive me?"
Charlotte, trying to look natural by chewing on her breakfast croissant despite having recently brushed her teeth, said, "That was- that was just me, Father. Just venting, stuff about school and studying that bugged me, things like that." That was among the stuff I talked about, so I'm technically not lying.
"And those footsteps?" Honoré didn't back off.
"Just me pacing, I do that sometimes," Charlotte said.
"A bad habit, you ought to restrain yourself more. Well, if that truthfully is all, I'll leave you be," Honoré said before he walked back the way he'd came.
Charlotte could've collapsed from relief. For now, she just thought, yeah, we seriously need to get Yoshitsune, Jafar, and whoever the new guy turns out to be somewhere far away from Honoré.
The Prevel house was a two-winged, triangle-roofed affair with a circular centre that stood right on the street corner. A post-schoolday Olivia came off as oddly giddy as she led Charlotte by the arm down the avenue and up to its gates, with Charlotte almost feeling like she was being rag-dolled along by her.
"See Charlotte, I knew you'd come around," Olivia said, but then looked downcast. "If only you'd seen reason and agreed to commit to studying sooner, before you let so much of your schoolwork pile up."
"Wow, even when I'm doing what you want, you still find a way to get all ungrateful," Charlotte muttered. Olivia glared at her for a second, as if she had something to say about being 'ungrateful'. But she said nothing, and just rang the doorbell and smiled as both her parents answered.
For as long as she'd known Olivia, Charlotte hadn't really bothered to remembered either of her parents' names. As cartoonish as it sounded, the fact Monsieur and Madame Prevel actually got along with their daughter, and her likewise, made Charlotte internally seethe. Still, if Olivia on her own had nothing to do with Horologium, then Charlotte at least knew who to suspect next.
"Oh, you brought your friend Charlotte with you?" Olivia's mother noticed, with Charlotte having a personal objection to a certain word. "Not that we mind, Olivia, it's just I think this is the first time Charlotte's visited in quite a while."
"Would've been about a year now, off the top of my head," Olivia's father said.
"Well you see, Charlotte's been going through a lot," Olivia said, then sighed, "A lot a lot." Charlotte almost had to giggle hearing that, Olivia may not have known just how right she was. "But as of now, that's all in the past and about to change. Isn't it, eh Charlotte?" Olivia then asked, eyeing her expectedly. When Charlotte didn't make much of a response, Olivia gritted her teeth and pulled her indoors and up a curved staircase to her room.
"Dinner's in an hour!" her father called up from below.
Olivia's room, and it was indeed a room and not a mere curtained-off section of an attic, would be expected to be festooned with textbooks. Yet while there as a fair few of those, Charlotte was surprised to see a little more variety, given she hadn't been in here in over a year. There was a quite large bed with a range of fuzzy pillows spread along it, and what looked like a few toys from Olivia's childhood. Given her other role at school besides Class Rep, there was a fair few theatre posters, scripts, and recordings, but also a computer and games console of all things. Okay, I can at least see her saying the computer's for 'research', but how can she bitch to me about 'distractions' when she has a gaming console? Charlotte thought. It didn't help her mood that all the games she owned were strictly for the computer, given Honoré would never have given her anywhere near the money for an additional console.
"Oh no, Charlotte! I meant what I said about no distractions," Olivia said the instant she saw Charlotte eyeing said console. She then dragged Charlotte over and sat her down on a desk, "This is still your detention, remember? We're getting through your homework before you touch anything else. However, since you came to me and agreed to study, why don't you choose which subject we work on first?"
"Er, History," Charlotte said. Really she'd meant to pick at random, but it was little surprise that subject would be first to spring to her mind. Not that having genuinely met people from history turned out to help much, given the coursework was mostly the standard stuff about Louis XIV, the Revolution, Napoleon, little bit about the Dreyfus affair, those sorts of things. Elizabeth II was probably too recent, Japanese history was a non-starter, and even rereading Iznogoud would test her knowledge of the ancient Caliphate better. Maybe the Literature stuff would bring up Pinocchio… if she lived in Italy, maybe.
As the minutes started to feel like hours, and Olivia's words of tutoring condensed into one big blur, the malaise was then broken by a knock on the door. "Olivia dear, could you help with preparing dinner?" her mother asked.
"Sure, I'll be right down!" Olivia said, with her first giving an icy look at Charlotte. "Stay here and keep at your studies, don't think because I'm not in the room you can just do whatever. Charlotte, I mean it when I say your future's on the line here," she then pleaded at the last second.
Charlotte nodded, but the instant Olivia was out of the room, she began rummaging around for any evidence that linked her with Horologium. Huh, nothing in her drawers, nothing in her game cases 'sides games, doesn't feel like there's anything stuffed into her old toys, and definitely no cameras around, Charlotte went over her findings.
She only had just about enough time to put everything back in its place before Olivia re-entered, but not enough to quickly sit back down at the desk and look like she'd been sticking with her studies. "Charlotte…" Olivia narrowed her eyes before she asked, "What were those noises I just heard?"
"Olivia, well, it really looks like I'm gonna have to tell you," Charlotte said, her words perhaps not being the clearest right now. "Those impalements the other day, that wasn't just some random killer. And those cameras I smashed; they belonged to the same organisation who sent that Impaler to kill me. That's why I'm warning you, in case they try to kill you too."
"What the- Have you lost your mind?" Olivia raised her voice.
"I can prove it here and now," Charlotte spoke back as she took out her Antikythera. "This is what they, Horologium, use to summon anyone or anything from people's memories to make them their soldiers. Here, I'll show you." Even if she still had no idea of the exact requirements to summon a certain Remembered Dead, if it wasn't all just random anyway, Charlotte still spun the Antikythera clockwise to perform her first intentional summon.
Like both times before, the same gleaming flash then emerged, which made a gasping Olivia stumble back up against a wall. However, the Dead summoned this time was neither warrior nor vizier, but instead… some girl about the same age as Charlotte and Olivia, dressed in what could be pinpointed as Napoleonic-era clothing, high-waisted with a long dress. And where Charlotte looked ratty and Olivia stiff and uptight, this pale, pimply, scrawny girl looked even less like any belle of the ball.
"M-my apologies for the intrusion," this summoned girl immediately bowed, "I truly did not mean to startle anyone. My name is Catherine Morland, and… I appear to have no idea where I am."
