Keomi woke up the following morning dead on her feet, she had gotten close to three hours of sleep and was now expected to function normally. She had suffered through more nightmares in those three hours then any other time in her life. It was four in the morning and she glanced at the two coats that hung on her chair. Her own with little splats of blood and then Chuuya's, which she had taken in a rage last night.
Which meant she would be forced to see the man again. Lovely.
She didn't know what their mission would entail so she decided to go with her more usual look. She wore a dark colored sweater and... she glanced at her coat. Could she really wear a coat with little splotches of blood on it? If they were infiltrating it wouldn't matter. But if they were trying to blend in then she probably wouldn't be able to bring it.
She took it to the sink trying to scrub the blood out of the jacket, which she managed but then her coat was soaked. It wouldn't dry in time and she could try a hair dryer but she really didn't want to damage it. She glanced at the coat that Chuuya had given her the night before. It was his fault that she even had the option of wearing it and it wasn't like he was going to come by for it this early in the morning.
She sighed going to slip on his coat because his coat was better than no coat at all. It was longer than her normal coat, but because he was so short in stature it fit pretty well. A knock on the door sounded throughout the room, which she quickly answered.
Akutagawa stood at the door, glancing up and down at her outfit. He tilted his head at her his eyebrow going up slightly. Their outfits looked extremely similar considering the kind of coat she was wearing.
"Ready to go Aku?" She spoke with a small smile on her face, which caused Akutagawa to let out a whispered 'Ch'.
"Glad that you're on time at least." Akutagawa remarked turning around and heading down the hallway, not checking to see if his protege was behind him or not.
"Oi! That was one time!" Keomi ran after the man yelling in retort. She had only been late to one training practice and that was only because she could barely move in the first place. It had been early on in her training and her body, while fit for her impending police training, was not strong enough to support her ability for hours on end.
Keomi had spent three days at her new place of residence, today was here second day of training. Akutagawa had told her they would be seeing how far she could go today. While it worried the girl she also was curious to what all that entailed.
Keomi arrived before Akutagawa, so she decided to get in some light stretching. So far training hadn't been too difficult, now that her ability had fully manifested. She didn't have complete control over it yet, but she understood the basic mechanics of how it worked.
She could conjure a numerous amount of items from her crystals. The majority of her ability focused on her mind, how sharp she was, how creative she was, and how easily she could block out distractions. The last one was the hardest part, because she had to pay attention without letting her foundation crumble.
"Kurisutaru." Her ability never summoned crystals by itself, her ability simply gave her the tools she needed to create more. She didn't know how many crystals she could make or how large of a structure she could conjure. These would be things to test later.
Keomi spread her footing until her feet were shoulder width apart. Her arms brought up allowing crystals to float around her arms. If she touched her crystals they would shatter, something Akutagawa said she would have to work on if she wanted stay at the port mafia.
She swirled the tiny crystals around her over and over repeating the movement while trying to create more crystals. She continued to repeat the movement this time throwing her arm forward making the crystals strike out like a whip. Keomi nodded to herself, that could do nicely.
Except her attacks weren't very strong because of how small the crystals were. They weren't dense enough to do any real damage. They looked pretty, but they didn't do much else for her.
Keomi brought one of her crystals to the palm of her hand, like she had done when she was at the clothing store with Chuuya. She couldn't touch it but maybe if she really focused-
"Should I even ask what you're doing?" Akutagawa walked in from behind her entering the training room they had been using for the past couple of days.
"I'm practicing, if I want to become stronger I need to master my ability." Akutagawa looked at the medium sized crystal in her hand and sent a thread of Rashomon at it. It dissolved into particles once more, being utterly useless against his ability.
"Very impressive work." Akutagawa mocked walking away from her, "I'm not training you today."
"Akutagawa where are you going?" Keomi yelled after him watching him turn around and walk towards the door he had just came from.
"I want to see improvement tomorrow, by any means necessary." Akutagawa didn't look at her but she could hear the coldness in his voice. She flinched not liking that he was mad at her.
"Very Well." She spoke, to herself, and began to summon the crystal to her hand once more. She didn't understand how someone was meant to control their ability. How they figured it out with ease. To her it seemed like the ability was living and breathing, an extension of herself yes... but alive in its own way apart from her to.
One Crystal barely took any of the particles that floated around her. Particles that most people couldn't even see. She ran her hands in the air around the tiny specks of crystal dust. They were so frail.
"It's connected to my mind instead of my hands." She muttered remembering Akutagawa had told her multiple times that she needed to strengthen her mind for that very reason.
"So, if I imagine that the crystal has more particles in it-" She trailed off closing her eyes imagining that the crystal would gain more and more particles. If her eyes had been opened she would have noticed how the crystal began to sink lower to the ground, closer to her hand.
Her eyes snapped open as the crystal touched the palm of her hand. It wasn't shattering. In fact it felt similar to a large rock, something that could actually protect or do damage.
A smile graced Keomi's lips.
She threw out her hand sending the crystal spiraling towards the wall. She concentrated, maybe she could control its path like she could the particles. The crystal stayed on its path until she finally made it take a small turn, still it hit the wall violently. But it didn't shatter.
"I can do this."
She had trained herself so hard that day that she passed out later on. She had woken up late and found Akutagawa in a foul mood the next day. Though she would like to think that his mood improved after seeing the progress she had made on her own. She had been able to control a crystal that could withstand Rashomon. While her shield wasn't completely strong enough yet, there was improvement.
"Shizuka?" Akutagawa stopped them before they exited headquarters, calling out her name. She turned towards him her eyebrows raised and her head tilting.
"Here, since you graduated from you first part of training I-" Akutagawa paused pulling a small box from out of his pocket, "Just take 'em."
He shoved the box into her grasp continuing out the building leaving his protege behind. Even if the girl wouldn't be able to trust him with important things, she should be able to trust him some. They were partners.
Keomi was shocked by the contents of the small, slender box. There were a pair of leather black gloves. She couldn't help the smile that made its way onto her face.
"Oi, hurry up I have to tell you the mission's details." Akutagawa yelled for her to follow, his eyes flickering back to his protege. A ghost of a smile on his face.
She wouldn't have to worry about the feeling of blood on her fingertips anymore. Plit-plat. She took the gloves out from the box, they were cool and smooth against her calloused hands. Her hands had started to break under the pressure of her ability, red scales had cracked open across her pale skin. Every time she physically used her ability her hands would crack violently.
She slipped on the gloves one hand at a time, they were soft on her broken skin. She flexed her hands and murmured, "Kurisutaru."
The crystal particles arose around her like wisps and she conjured her whips to see if her hands would crack once more. They didn't. While already dry and cracked well beyond a normal hand, they hadn't gotten any worse.
"Shizuka!" Akutagawa growled out already outside waiting for her. She dispersed her crystals and took off to learn of her first mission.
"Finally, what were you doing in there? Taking a nap?" Akutagawa nagged at her his face scrunched up and his hands waving about in her face. She simply smirked at him. Causing his nagging to intensify.
"Yeah, I thought a nap would be good Aku. Maybe you should go back and get one yourself if you're gonna be all crabby."
"Crabby!" Akutagawa shouted at her only getting more riled up as she threw nicknames and annoying words at him. She couldn't help but laugh at him, he was so easy.
"Why are you laughing!" Akutagawa swatted his hand at her only for her to jump out of the way, her laughing only increasing. She was full blown smiling now while Akutagawa just stopped and waited till she was done.
Though he couldn't say he wasn't happy to see her smile after everything that transpired yesterday.
"Alright Aku, I'm fine, I'm-" Just a quick look at his unamused face had her laughing all over again. She couldn't help it, he looked like an angry kitten.
"Are you done now, Shizuka?" Keomi nodded once, still slightly giggling, but Akutagawa went right into the mission ignoring that.
"The military managed to catch one of our operatives, The Boss needs them back." Akutagawa neglected to mention that should they be unable to rescue the operative then their mission was to kill him. He was sure between the two of them that they could get the operative back.
"Are they an ability user?" Keomi questioned wondering how the military would be able to catch someone from the port mafia. Especially an ability user.
"She's a low-level ability user, she can talk to animals and manipulate their actions through that. She's been using them for surveillance." Akutagawa explained rather disgustedly, he disliked ability users with weak abilities. Getting caught by the government of all people, pathetic.
He would not mind cutting her down, except the boss wanted her alive if possible. Her ability was too powerful outside of the mafia though.
"I can see how that would be useful." Keomi replied nodding as he explained what they would have to do. Blood would be spilled, she wasn't stupid. The military weren't just going to hand her over to them. They would try to capture them to once they figured out they were ability users.
"We will be infiltrating their main building where prisoners are held. We are only there for the operative known as Sumia, no one else."
"Yes, Sir." Keomi exclaimed raising her hand to her head in a salute, a smirk on her face. Akutagawa simply rolled his eyes and continued to lead them through the shadows of the city.
"We will be entering through the rooftop and going into the air vents." Akutagawa explained as he climbed up a ladder to access a different rooftop relatively near the government building. This would be his protégé's first test, one that could have extreme consequences should she fail.
"So then, how are we getting to the rooftop?" Keomi asked as she climbed up the ladder behind him trying to match his fast pace.
"That's for you to decide. I'll meet you there."
"Wha-" Keomi yelled but Akutagawa had already summoned his ability and taken off towards the government building. Keomi stood on the regular rooftop in wonder, blinking slowly.
He had just left her here? To fend for herself and to infiltrate a government site? Oh she was going to shred him in training tomorrow.
"Kurisutaru." Keomi summoned her crystal particles, since they had been fading since she summoned them at the mafia. She tried to think of the easiest way should could infiltrate the government building with it. It was great in combat, but they hadn't done much training in stealth.
"I mean I could use my armor since it boosts my strength and speed..." Keomi spoke aloud to herself, "But my crystals are so shiny, the exact opposite of what you want for stealth."
"Maybe I could localize the armor to just my feet to make myself faster." Keomi mumbled focusing some of her crystals to her feet. She jumped back and forth on her toes, trying to see how much faster she was with the armored shoes.
"I don't think this will work." Keomi brought a single crystal to her palm, analyzing the properties of her abilities.
The crystal was a pale purple, translucent, dense, and sharp. It could withstand attacks if she thickened it or it could become lightweight if she allowed less particles near it.
"It's translucent." Keomi muttered in shock wondering how Aku and her had never considered expanding on this property of her ability. If she made her ability extremely thin it was like it was see through, but what if there were two sheets of it next to each other?
She split her crystal into two, then flattened them until there were twin sheets of mirroring crystals next to each other. She placed her hand in between the two and then went to look in the sheets. All she could see was the pale colors of her hand and even then, if she wasn't looking for it she would probably ignore it.
She smiled to herself. Take that Akutagawa! She was going to scare the shit out of him. But first she needed to cover her body in the mirroring translucent sheets. She spread out the sheets, which defied physics slightly, and let it coat her like the armor did. Only it was thin and didn't stick to her body. Instead it floated an inch above her skin, which made it more difficult to control. It took more concentration and energy.
The sheets didn't make her faster or stronger and it would probably break on contact with anything hard. Which meant when she needed to get up the building she would have to strengthen it and she would lose the invisibility.
Still, she walked right through the front gate with ease, no one could see her. She walked on the path until she needed to go to the back where there was less guards. Crunch. Her eyes snapped down to the branch underneath her foot.
"What was that?" She heard one of the guards say from a few feet away. She quickly stepped off of the branch and went towards the trees. One of the guards was now looking at the branch she had stepped on moments before.
She would need to be more careful, the world could be manipulated by her feet because the sheets weren't underneath her shoes. If she ever walked on see-through material they could see her as well. All things that she would have to take into account. Perhaps she should take a note book and start writing down the extent of her ability.
It had been almost two months now after all, it had taken that long to train in her ability... according to Aku. They had trained with so many things that she had forgotten some of the ways her ability could be used by now. She normally stuck to her whips and her armor because they were so versatile. A good offense and defense.
Keomi continued to walk, not wanting to run in fear of accidentally hitting something and breaking her sheets. She finally came upon an area without any guards, the only worrying aspect was the camera in the corner.
She willed the few particles she had left up near the camera, since the particles were practically invisible themselves. She then caused them to come around the camera and block its view completely. Only then did she allow the sheets to dissolve into particles again. Then she summoned her armor and began to climb.
The building was mostly bare, minus the few ledges that protruded out from the windows. She strengthened the armor in her feet and leapt up to one that was a story above. She then moved the strength from her feet into her arms, allowing herself to easily pull herself up onto the ledge.
She continued to move the density in her armor to scale the building. Sweat grew behind her neck growing on Chuuya's jacket. She had made the right choice to bring the jacket though. Even if she probably could have worn her own. Having the black coat around her, knowing its been on countless missions of its own... She would be fine.
She made quick work of the building and arrived at the top after forty-five minutes since Aku had issued the challenge. Akutagawa was leaning on the building with Rashomon wrapped around him. He seemed at ease as he waited for his Protege to make it up to the rooftop. Though he seemed ready to be waiting for awhile.
Akutagawa raised his head to look at his protege, she looked like a wild beast. Keomi had given up on her wind blown hair, she was exhausted from using her ability in so many different forms. Akutagawa raised an eyebrow at her his eyes looking her up and down.
"Come on Aku, let's continue the mission now." Keomi rolled her eyes at him and began to inch closer to where he was at. Hopefully the rest of the mission went smoothly, because she didn't know if she could use too much more of her ability.
"Gladly."