Author's Note: Have plans to add something new to each chapter from the next one onwards to help cut down info dumps.

Enjoy.

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Chapter 28: Found

Grace Cooper was taken to Toronto in a private airplane. The flight took several hours and landed at the Toronto Pearson International Airport. She had her luggage with her so going through Customs took less than twenty minutes.

When she exited the arrival gate, she saw a middle-aged Caucasian man in a suit standing in the waiting area. He held up a small white sign with the word "Cooper" written on it. Grace recognized the man from his photo from the briefing she was given on the flight. He was her CSIS liaison: Agent Dwayne Moore.

The man saw Grace and raised a hand to get her attention. She walked over with her suitcase rolling behind her.

"Agent Cooper?"

"A pleasure to meet you Agent Moore," Grace said as she held out her hand.

Moore grabbed and shook it. "Likewise."

"Were you briefed on the investigation?"

"I was. I was actually part of the task force responsible for locating Thunder. If you found him, it would be a relief to the agency and my government. I'll drive you to the Royal Elizabeth's Hospital right now if that's convenient."

"I would appreciate that, thank you."

The drive down to Oakley's Field took an hour and a half. During the drive, Cooper went over all of her notes with Moore. Moore in turned shared anything CSIS could come up. He was surprised at the idea of using subtle usage of Thunder's specialized powers to locate him.

CSIS' method centered around possible cases of vigilante justice around the world based on the person's affinity towards helping people. After listening to all of Grace's research, he was inclined to agree with her.

It was starting to get dark when they arrived at Royal Elizabeth's Hospital. They entered inside the hospital and founded the waiting room fairly empty and quiet. The two agents approached the reception desk where a woman in her seventies sat.

"Hello, is there something I can help you with?" she asked.

Moore pulled out his badge and flashed it. "I'm Agent Moore of CSIS and this is Agent Cooper with the CIA. We were hoping we could speak to someone who can provide a list of all employees who work here."

"Oh!" the woman yelped. "Yes, sir. I can get HR to meet with you. They would be able to give you that information. Is there a reason why you need this information?"

"I'm afraid we can't say," Cooper replied.

"Very well. There are three coloured lines on the floor that run down the hallway. Follow the green line until it ends. HR will be two doors past the end on the left. I'll let them know you're coming."

"Thank you," Moore said.

The agents spotted the green line on the floor and followed it. They walked down the hallway following the green line past various hospital rooms. Grace glanced into hospital rooms as they walked. She found it unusual that so many rooms were empty.

Their walk down the hall was interrupted when a young black man walked out of one of the hospital rooms with a clothing bin on wheels. The man had a medium build and buzz cut hair. The bin he pushed was filled with blankets. Grace looked at the man and saw he was slightly haunched over and his eyes were a little droopy.

"Oh sorry, Ma'am," he apologized. "Didn't see you there."

"It's quite alright," Grace said. "Are you alright? You look pretty tired."

"Oh... Rough day, today."

"We'll leave you be then," Moore said.

They went in separate directions in the hall. Eventually Grace and Moore came to the end of the green line. They followed the receptionist's direction and went over to the second door on the left. The agents opened the door and found the HR director sitting there with a file to his side.

"Agent Cooper, Agent Moore," he greeted. "Please come in. Tina mentioned you two wanted to see a list of employees here?"

"That's right," Moore replied. "Can you do that?"

"I can provide a list of employees and volunteers, but I can't go into personal lives or financial status without a warrant."

"Just the employee list will be enough."

The director handed them the folder with a couple pages inside. Moore grabbed the folder and opened it for Grace and him to read. It displayed a list of all the employees in alphabetical order. Next to each name was the position that worker held.

"Do you by any chance have a list sorted by date hired?" Grace asked.

"What is the exact reason that both CSIS and the CIA are interested in this hospital?"

"I'm afraid we cannot answer," Moore answered.

The director typed in a few commands on his computer to create the list they requested. The printer jumped to life and printed out another two pages of names. He walked over and picked it up. The director handed it to Grace.

"From the oldest hire to the most recent."

Cooper looked at the second page and went directly to the bottom. According to the page, only three people have been hired within the month, two women and one man. One of the women was hired as a nurse and the other in the Radiology department. The man was hired as a volunteer. Grace pulled out a notepad and wrote down the man's name and then handed it back to the director.

"Thank you for your time," she said.

"No problem. Is someone in trouble?"

"Oh, no, no," Moore assured him. "We just have some questions. Nothing more."

"Alright, then. Good luck in your investigation."

The three shook hands and the two agents left the office.

"Do we have a name?" Moore asked.

"We do. His name is Thomas Everett. It matches up. He volunteered about a few weeks ago, around the same time these miracle healings started. It has to be him."

Moore checked his watch and saw it was fairly late.

"I'll take the name and get it looked up," Moore said. "I'll get you to a hotel and we can find the guy in the morning."

VVVVVV

The Next Day...

Grace walked out of the hotel lobby to meet with Moore. Before she slept in her hotel bed, she watched the news to learn about a monster attack that happened earlier in the Everglades. The video footage from the tourists at the site of the attack, showed Thunder fighting against invisible monsters.

What was surprising was that Thunder had more allies fighting by his side. Despite the new situation, she was relieved that Thunder was still alive so they can get answers.

Moore drove up in his grey sedan. Cooper walked around the car and got into the passenger side. She noticed Moore had an irritated look on his face.

"Something wrong?" Grace asked.

"I was able to get Thomas Everett's profile. Look at this," he said while handing her a tablet.

Grace woke the tablet up from sleep mode and Thomas Everett's profile appeared before her. Her face drained of expression.

"This is the guy we ran into last night!"

"Exactly."

"Do we have an address?"

"Already punched into the GPS."

VVVVVV

Tom stood by the stove cooking fried eggs in one pan and hashbrown in another. He yawned as he lazily stared at the sizzling eggs. Footsteps coming out of the girls' room caught his attention. He looked over his shoulder and saw Reia walk into the kitchen while stretching her right arm behind her head.

"Morning," he greeted.

"Mmm, morning, Tom. What's cooking?"

"Something a little simple. Fried eggs, toast and hashbrown. I figured that Sylmae and Tala would want some protein and carbs to recuperate themselves. I also have some berries for something sweet. And speaking of something sweet."

Tom wrapped an arm around Reia's waist and pulled her in for a kiss.

"My, oh, my; so early in the morning?" another voice said.

Tom quickly released Reia and saw Vivian standing in the door way of the kitchen.

"Don't stop on my account."

Reia gave Tom a quick peck on the cheek before sitting down at the kitchen island counter. Vivian pulled up a chair next to her.

"Did you two go over your stats?" Tom asked.

"Yup," Reia replied.

"Same here," Vivian replied. "Got some great increases on my Strength and Endurance."

"If I recall, you made it to level twenty and can now take your second class," Tom said.

"Picked Barbarian. Gave me a boost towards my Strength, Endurance and Vitality. Also got a skill called Erupt."

EruptTypeActivateDamage Increase+5% of damage receivedRankBLevelBeginner 1 (0%)As a Barbarian you are able to take the pain and damage you receive and pay it back. The more damage you receive, the stronger your attack will be when you call upon this ability. You can only store the damage you received for the last twelve hours. After twelve hours, the stored damage will reset. Stored damage will also reset if used in an attack.

"That is a nice set of benefits," Tom said. He smiled and groaned while rubbing his head. "More data to add to the second edition of my guide to the SYSTEM."

"I also have a quest to do my training for my new class. I plan on doing it later today if we have nothing else important to do later today. Here's the weird thing. Apparently it takes place in the spirit realm."

"Just like Tom and me," Reia said. "The spirits who trained us were two of the six heroes."

"The heroes," Vivian muttered. "THE heroes."

"Yes," Reia assured her. "Niala Ryezious trained me as a Lancer and Delix Ryezious trained Tom to be a Magic Blade. You must be getting one of the heroes to train you."

"I hope it's Axel Jordfodt!"

"He's unique...?" Tom asked.

"Jordfodt is famous among Dwaves as one of the six heroes of the last war we had," Vivian explained. "A powerful warrior who has fought in many great battles. He was without equal in the Bolaweth Kingdom's army."

"Bolaweth. That's the largest Dwarven kingdom, right?"

Vivian nodded. "At the end of the war, things got desperate. So in order to end it, or at least buy us time to rebuild, the best warriors from around the world gathered to fight Hastur. While the six heroes died in battle against Hastur, they were successful in driving him back. In everyone's opinion, that was a victory. Axel Jordfodt's statue stands in front of the Bolaweth palace to forever remember him and his actions."

"Well, let us know when you plan to do your training. We can sit by you while you travel to the spirit realm and provide moral support."

"That's very sweet of you to offer."

"Ah, well. You know. Anything for a friend of Reia's"

"Anything?" Both Reia and Vivian said while raising a brow.

"So, how are Tala and Sylmae doing?" Tom quickly changed the topic.

"They're still out," Vivian replied. "Poor things. That quest was too much for them."

"We're up," Sylmae declared.

Sylmae and Tala sluggishly walked into the kitchen. Both look like they were recovering from a hangover.

"You two are here just in time," Tom said. "I made a high-protein, high-energy breakfast to help you two recover."

Tom served the eggs and hashbrown onto the plates next to him. He then placed some fruit and buttered toast next to them.

"That was... considerate of you," Tala said. "Thank you."

The girls walked over and grabbed their plates of food.

"We picked our classes," Sylmae said as she sat down. She placed one of the eggs on one of her pieces of toast. "I went with Rogue class." Syl took a bite out of her egg on toast.

"I picked Mage," Tala said. "I still have a lot of unallocated points to distribute though. I have so many that it's overwhelming."

"Well, I can provide some advice about how to distribute your points," Tom offered.

"I appreciate the offer."

"Do you need any help, Sylmae?"

Syl swallowed her food. "Hmm. Sure. Another perspective is always a good thing."

"Great. After breakfast we'll get to that."

A loud high-pitch squeal echoed throughout the area. Tom stood up and said in a hurry, "That's the driveway alarm. Everyone take your food to your room and wait there until the all-clear."

Reia and her friends were introduced to the driveway alarm. If someone entered the driveway, they would trip an infrared sensor. This sensor would then set off an alarm to give them roughly two minutes to hide. While Tom could use disguise to protect them if someone visited, he didn't want to risk suspicion if a neighbour visited or someone else he may know.

Truth be told, he never expected for the alarm to ever go off. For all intents and purposes, he was a hermit. Reia and her friends grabbed their plates of food and ran off to their room in the far side of the house.

Tom ran over to the window and looked outside. He saw a dark grey sedan exit out of the forest. It drove up to his house and parked behind his car. After it parked, two people exited the car. One was an old woman and the other was a middle-aged man.

'Aren't those the two from the hospital last night?'

Tom back away from the window and sat down by the counter and waited for them to knock on his door.

Thunk, thunk, thunk!

Tom got up and slowly walked towards the door. He could see the silhouettes of his two visitors through the translucent glass windows around the door. Tom opened the door and said, "Can I help you?"

"Thomas Everett?" the woman asked.

"Yeah?"

"I'm Agent Grace Cooper from the CIA and this is Agent Dwayne Moore from CSIS."

"Okay..." While Tom was portraying a lazy lethargic demeanour to these two, he was cursing a storm in his thoughts. "What are agents from the CIA and CSIS doing here?"

"We have been investigating the individual known as Thunder," Moore stated matter-of-factly. "That investigation eventually led us to you."

"To me?" Tom continued feigning ignorance.

"You're Thunder," Moore further clarified.

"Me?" Tom scoffed. "You're joking. I'm just a nobody."

"Mister Everett, we have come a long way to get to this point and we'd rather not make this difficult," Grace said. "While we can't forcibly take you in, we do have enough evidence to request a DNA test. You left samples of your blood at different monster sites. This method, however, may raise a lot of attention. Public attention."

Tom's lower right eyelid twitched. He pushed his teeth together so tightly they felt like they were going to break. Many thoughts raced through his head. Mostly incoherent yelling and swearing. Tom weighed his options and decided his next course of action.

"Come in," he sighed.

Tom stood aside and allowed the two agents to enter his house. He led them to a table in the dining room. They took a seat at the table and Tom sat down across from them.

"Am I under arrest?" he asked. "And how did you find me?"

"No," Cooper answered. "We want you to help us. The governments of the world wants to know what is happening to our world. Even help us defend lives. As for how we found you, there are a lot of factors. Though the biggest one was the people you healed at the hospital. Those miracle healings helped us focus our search."

"Great, my good deeds gave me away," he groaned.

"Do you know what is causing these disturbances around the world?" Moore asked.

"Yeah... I know. Before we start, do you want me to get them?"

"The nonhumans?" Moore asked.

"My companions. Yes."

Moore looked hesitant of letting Tom leave the table. He glanced over to Cooper.

"If he was going to run, he would have just teleported out," she said, knowing what he was thinking.

"Just give me a few minutes," Tom said as he got up from the table.

Tom walked over to the girls' room and entered inside. Everyone was quietly eating their food.

"I'm sorry, everyone," he apologized. "We've been found. The two people out there are agents from CSIS, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, and the CIA, America's Central Intelligence Agency."

"What's going to happen to us?" Tala asked. Her voice betrayed her fear.

"It's going to be okay," Tom assured them. "We're not going to be arrested. They just want to know what's going on. Probably more. Look, I won't let anyone take any of you away or harm you. I will explain to them what is happening and get us some insurance while I'm at it. Now before anything... I want you all be out there with me out there while I explain the situation to the agents. While out there, there is to be no mention of Kara. Instead we will refer to her as the Great Sage."

"What? Why?" Sylmae spat out.

"It's already going to be hard enough for them to believe what I have to tell them. I don't need to add in gods as well."

"He has a point," Vivian said.

"This world isn't used to speaking often with a god," Reia added.

"Not without being sent to a mental institute," Tom muttered. "Is everyone ready?"

"We are," Sylmae sighed.

"Come on then."

Tom led the girls out from their room to the kitchen where the agents waited. They were talking to each other while they waited for him. Seeing the nonhumans walk into the kitchen silenced the agents. The girls pulled out a chair at the table and sat down.

"Agent Cooper, Agent Moore," Tom stated. "This is Reia Zyer of the Naga race. Codename: Aurora."

"Hi," Reia greeted.

"Sylmae Lyvan of the Elven race. Codename: Tempest."

"A pleasure to meet you both," she said with a slight bow.

"Tala Mau of the Beastkin race. Feline subrace. Codename: Pyre."

"H-Hello," Tala stuttered.

"And Vivian Terrabane of the Dwarven race. Codename: Terra."

"Hiya!" Vivian said enthusiastically.

"It is an honour to meet you all," Grace said. She pulled out a recorder and placed it on the counter. "I'm going to be recording this conversation. Now can you explain in detail what is happening to our world."

"Before we start, I have conditions for the information I have," Tom said. "All reasonable I assure you, but they must be fulfilled."

"We're listening," Moore said.

"First condition: immunity to any crime we may have committed while fighting around the world. Second, our identities are to be kept secret from the public. And third, my companions are to be granted Canadian citizenship. And I don't mean eventually in the future. I mean within the week. Those are the conditions."

Moore rested his right elbow on the table and held his chin as he thought over the demands. "Why the citizenship?"

"To put it plainly, it's because they're not Human. It's a possible loophole in our laws that could cause them to be treated less than any other person. Currently at best, only laws concerning animals can apply to them. If they are given citizenship, that will help prevent possible legal abuses until our laws and Human rights are expanded to cover them and other nonhumans."

"I understand. It can be done. It's certainly unusual but it can be done."

"Then my terms are acceptable?"

"They are acceptable. Can you now tell us what you know about these monster appearances?"

"Just so we're clear, the explanation I will be giving you is going to be fantastical and hard to believe."

"Considering what is happening around the world, an explanation would be expected to be as such," Grace said.

"Okay, okay," he muttered. "I'll start at the beginning. A month ago. While walking, I had a blue window appear before me. Like a pop-up screen on your computer, but in real life. It had a message that stated that I was selected along with ninety-nine others to partake in a test to gain early access to the SYSTEM."

"SYSTEM?" Grace asked.

"It covers a wide variety of otherworldly properties, such as the ability to use magic, information given form thanks to said magic, and levels like an RPG video game. So the test in question was to defeat a random monster."

"And that's why monsters appeared in ninety-nine other locations around the world," Moore stated.

"Correct," Tom said. "The monster I fought was a cyclops. I got really lucky and tricked it into falling into a hole. It broke its neck and I finished it off with a rock to its head. With that I passed the test and every monster around the world vanished."

"Who instigated this test?" Grace asked.

Tom raised a finger telling her to give him a moment. "After the test, I was given access to the SYSTEM along with many skills. One of those skills gives me the ability to communicate with an individual known as the Great Sage. The one who created the test."

"And why did this Great Sage create the test?"

"To give us a chance. Do either of you know of the Many-Worlds Interpretation?"

Moore shook his head in the negative.

"That's the theory that there are infinite universes," Grace answered. "Each one can differ by minute or vastly different variables."

"That's it more or less," Tom said. "That's where all those monsters are coming from. That's where my companions came from. Another universe. Their world is called Xoth. It is home to six different races. Elf, Dwarf, Beastkin, Naga, Orc and Demon."

"Demons?" Moore scoffed.

"Don't laugh," Vivian growled.

Moore stiffened in his seat from Vivian's sudden outburst.

"I'm not talking about fallen-angels-of-human-religions demons," Tom clarified. "On Xoth, Demons are just another race of people. These races used to live in harmony. That ended three hundred years ago when the Demon Lord was assassinated by Hastur who took the throne for himself. Since then the races of Xoth have be in an on-off war with the Demons. The last war ended eighteen years ago when the six great heroes fought Hastur and greatly wounded him. Now he has returned and he has already enacted his first move in this new war."

Cooper and Moore leaned in.

"In less than a year's time, Xoth and Earth... will merge into a new world."

"What?" the two agents gasped.

"That's what the Great Sage told me. Hastur casted an extremely powerful spell that will combine our worlds. What we have seen so far are mere tremors before the big quake."

"How are you able to communicate with this... Great Sage?" Cooper asked.

"One of my skills allows me to speak through the SYSTEM. The Great Sage responds with message windows through the SYSTEM. It was using this skill I was able to learn about this apocalyptic scenario. She even gave me the exact date when our worlds will fuse. May 3rd, 2021. It's because of this why the Great Sage intervened and slightly modified the spell Hastur cast. This created the test to give us the opportunity to join the SYSTEM so we could prepare for the new world."

"Then what about Phoenix?" Moore said. "Did they take the test?"

"No," Tom replied. "I later found out that Hastur managed to send one of his officers into our world on M-Day. He is known as Mordiggian. Through my investigation and talks with the Great Sage, I discovered that Mordiggian managed to connect Rika Darma and some of her followers to the SYSTEM through the use of Soul Axes."

"Then why don't we get some of these Soul Axes and connected our soldiers to the SYSTEM?" Moore suggested.

Tom glared at him. "We cannot do that."

"Why not?"

"A Soul Axes is... the concentrated essence of a person." Tom did everything he could to dance around the fact that these gems are basically souls. "They are obtained through the use of dark magic by extracting it from a person or hybrid-abominations like those Slimes in Australia. It requires murder to acquire one. This is why the use or sale of Soul Axes is banned all across Xoth, except on the Demon continent."

"Oh..."

"So we have eleven months until our worlds merge," Grace said.

"Right," Tom replied.

"Do you have any proof of any of this?" Moore asked. "The merger of our worlds or an upcoming war?"

Tom thought on the question and answered, "Not in the way of a video of Hastur declaring his plans. All of my information comes from the Great Sage. My companions can attest to the character of the Great Sage."

"And we would without a second thought," Sylmae added.

"Is she widely regarded on your world?" Grace asked Syl.

"She is the most respected person on our world. Everyone goes to her for guidance. If she says our worlds are going to merge, then they are going to merge."

"How did your companions come to our world?" Grace asked.

"Luck," Tom replied. "They happened to be transferred by the merger magic and I came across them and gave them shelter."

Cooper and Moore were quiet as they thought over what they were told.

"This is troubling," Grace said, breaking the silence.

"Troubling?" Moore muttered. "This news is far worse than anything we could have anticipated."

"I wish I could have given you better news," Tom said solemnly. "You know it's kinda funny. Today was the day I was going to release all of this information to the public."

"And how we're you planning to do that?" Moore asked.

"I had a large information packet that I was going to drop off at various news stations and Intelligence agencies. Teleport in, make my presence known, drop off the packet, and teleport out. The info packet contains a cover letter that explains the situation, a guide to the SYSTEM, a report that contains recommendations about what the world should do to prepare for the merger, and the translation of two books from Xoth. That last part took the longest. I spent the entire month translating them."

"Why did it take so long to translate two books?" Moore inquired. "And how do you understand their language? In fact... how do your companions know our language?"

"It's a skill called Language Comprehension. We can read, write and speak any language. Very useful. As for the translations, there are a variety of reasons. A lot of words in Xoth don't translate directly into English. I either had to substitute them with another word that means almost the exact same or create footnotes to explain the word. Also the two books I translated are a history book and an animal encyclopedia."

InventoryCapacity30/30Basic History of XothBestiary of XothCloak Of The Unsung HeroSky's FuryBC500 Wyvern ArmourInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation PacketInformation Packet

Tom reached into his Inventory causing Moore and Cooper to back up in their seats. To them, Tom's hands reached into nothing making it look like they were cut off. The ends of the arms appeared as a black surface instead of showing the bloody insides.

Tom pulled his hands back out of the Inventory space. In them he held a large box. He let the box fall onto the table to make a loud thud noise. Tom lifted the lid off of the box. Cooper and Moore looked inside the box to see it was filled with a large stack of papers.

"As you can see, It was a lot to translate. A month was a reasonable amount of time considering I also had to train and do missions."

"Do you have this information on a USB?" Cooper asked.

"I have multiple USBs that contain these documents. Just in case." Tom reached into his pocket and pulled out a USB key. "I didn't want to give these out since I feared you people might be able to track me down using them."

"Mister Everett would you being willing to meet with the world leaders and brief them about this situation?" Cooper asked. "Would you also be willing to work by our side to handle the situation?"

"Will we still be able to fight monsters and do our quests like we did before?"

"You would," Moore answered. "Just with government support."

"My conditions will be upheld?"

"They will."

Tom looked over to his companions. Through his glance he nonverbally asked them for their opinion. Each of them nodded with a smile. He turned back to the two agents.

"Alright," he replied.

"Excellent we can take a flight to Ottawa and Washington DC-" Grace said before she was interrupted.

"Maybe we can speed things. I really want my information to reach the public as soon as possible."

"What do you have in mind-?" Grace asked before she stopped herself. "Oh..."

Tom smiled. "Why fly when I can just teleport?"