Sumire and Roger, entering the San Francisco Bay. Just at the bottleneck of the Golden Gate Bridge, a mile long red construct looming over them.

She rubbed her eyes of sleep, walking up the steps to the deck. The boat was at a standstill in the water. This must be the private gate…

The private gate—one of the many around the city—was a funnel all around San Francisco. Every entrance in or out of this privately owned city had a check-in point, and the parts that weren’t a funnel to get into the city were blocked off with high walls.

San Francisco became privately owned after Sky Crash caused earthquakes and tsunamis and razed the city to the ground. The wealthy people that survived thought: why not rebuild it in our image?

So they did. Now it operated like its own country. It had its own economy for all intents and purposes and even its own flag. The filthy rich corporations that run the city like it this way, and even though a lot has changed… in totality not much has since that fateful day the sky came crashing down.

San Francisco was like a world of its own, gated away from the rest of the world’s owes. Blanketed in fog, the rich preferred this, too.

Roger was talking to the coast guard, as best a Sumire could tell. He caught her eye and gestured for her to come over.

“Show them your ID,” he said.

Sumire reached into her back pocket and pulled out her Faifer ID, it acted as a passport. She handed it to the guard and he inspected it before scanning the card. The man, dressed in Coast Guard military blue camo, looked at a screen on the scanner.

“Lady Sumire… Welcome to San Francisco,” he said, handing it back. He turned away and jumped off the boat onto his own.

Roger saluted them and started the boat back up, slowly inching away. “I got in because I have family here, you got in because Faifer has good relations with San Francisco,” Roger says. “I’ve been communicating with them about the overboard crew, apparently they found them.”

“Oh, that’s good! Your family lives here, Roger?” Must be rich…

“My foster family, yeah. I told them we were a couple and are paying a visit to them when the ship was hijacked by bootleggers. They bought it, and it’s not far from the truth, anyways.”

Sumire felt suspicious of Roger… He’s shrouded in mystery, she thought. She just couldn’t put her finger on it, whatever it was that set off an alarm, or what type of alarm it was. He hasn’t lied to me, she knew. But that doesn’t mean he isn’t hiding something…

“I’d like to know more about you, Roger…”

Roger looked up at her, and back to steering the ship. “In due time, I’m sure I’ll tell you everything about me. I just have that feeling.”

“So what are we actually doing here?”

“We’re training, really. You’ve got to get you up to speed with your mutations, and I’ve got to get my Humanities License. You’re going to spend a week at the Shrine here.”

“Okay, fair enough… but what’s a Humanity License?”

“Humanities. I should’ve gotten it a long time ago when I became a private detective. It’s a type of License from the Academy's, it gives you access to a lot of information on people. If you pass various tests, they give them to you free of charge. The course is a week long.”

“I didn’t know any of that…”

“That’s because you’ve been living in a castle!” Roger laughed. “That all ends today. I’m dropping you off at a certain Shrine and you’re gonna undergo a hellish, crash course training.”

“A certain Shrine? Why does that sound so ominous…”

“I know a person there, and because we’re in San Fran all the staff is the best of the best. You’ll be in good hands.”

“What do we do afterward?”

“After I get my hands on the Humanities License I’ll have a wealth of information at my fingertips and we can take it from there. Or, conversely, we’ll do whatever it is you want to do, Sumire.”

Sumire’s senses went off lightly, even though she wasn’t looking for it. It was a bald lie, the part about motive, that was her intuition. “Are you sure you don't have some sort of plan, Roger?”

Roger sighed, steering the ship. “I forgot you’re a lunar user, detecting lies and shit… I have my own reasons for following you, let’s just put it that way.”

Sumire didn’t detect a lie but pushed further. “There you go, lying again. You must’ve been choosing your words very carefully because you didn’t forget shit.”

“It’s not good to be so suspicious of friends, Sumire. I’ll explain myself to you after you complete your training.”

“Actually, I was the one who was lying. It seems I can’t detect a lie when it comes to you. But now it shows me you aren’t who you say you are. So who are you, Roger?”

Sumire put her arms akimbo, standing defiantly. Roger looked over his shoulder at her, then back to boating. He glanced back again, shaking his head this time.

“You got me, I guess. I guess you won’t take no for an answer, huh?”

“Are you even a private detective? How do I know anything you said is true?”

“All that is true, as all good bluffs go, lies are best shrouded in the truth. Sumire, I don’t suppose you know what a halfbreed is?”

“Sounds like something in a fairytale.”

“You should give more credence to fairytales.”

“So what, you're a supposed halfbreed?”

“Well, yes… but If I’m right, you’re also one, Sumire.”

She shook her head in disbelief. “You’re saying I’m the halfbreed, now? What makes you say that?”

“Your curious usage of frost and your prophecy. Really, you're the strange one for not seeing it. It makes perfect sense if you're the daughter of a Blight Lord, and now we’ll see if it’s true.”

Sumire felt light headed suddenly. The kind of distraught feeling she had when she was a kid, and everyone seemed to know something about her that she didn’t. She felt her forehead, looking down, not having the words to describe her frustration.

“You’re turning this on me. Who are you, Roger?”

“I’m many things to many people. I’ve gone by a hundred names and faces to different people in different places. Sumire, I’m a halfbreed in a way… much more technical than your case.”

“Hmm—still skirting around the question, are we?”

“Call me a quarterbreed, is what I mean. I’m the third generation of a pairing of Dryad and man… Why don’t you ask a Lady of the Shrine when you get there, ask them about Dryads. They’ll gladly tell you all about them.”

Sumire threw up her hands in defeat. “So what about me? Why do you think I'm this… halfbreed?”

They were approaching the dock, coming to a stop. Roger said: “You’re less a halfbreed in a traditional sense, and more like a daughter of a monster.”

“You really have a way with words, you know that?”

“I just mean to say there’s not a word for what you are. If you're related to a Blight Lord, that must make you a Blight Lady, eh?” He chuckled.

“Way to laugh at your own jokes…”

“Don’t be so dejected, jeez. Brighten up! This is a great opportunity to understand who you are,” Roger said, shrugging in his seat.

Sumire thought to herself: I like being who I am, there was never any need to complicate things… But I suppose I’m the only person forcing this on myself. After all, I’m the one going on an adventure.

“You’re right, I know you’re right,” Sumire says, “it just unsettles me… that part of me is something unknown. It’s a scary thought, right?”

Roger docked the boat and jumped off the side to the pier, tying the boat up to it. He looked up at Sumire, saying, “It’s all a matter of perspective.”

“There you go, saying that again.”

“I’ll tell the Shrine to teach you some of it on your stay. Speaking of which… Jump off the boat, it’s time to go.”

= = =