It happened about a year ago....
~*F*~
Ally opened her eyes. Her vision was
blurry. The room seemed to be spinning. Blinking, Alameda began
picking up sounds that seemed to be extremely distant. She felt numb,
as though her body was floating in midair. The thought frightened
her, and she bolted up. A searing pain in her chest brought her back
to reality.
“Hey, hey! You’re not fit to be
getting up yet,” a stranger said.
Ally couldn’t see a thing as it was
dark, and heard only these words and felt someone trying to push her
down. Naturally, she reacted by punching him as hard as she could.
“Oooowww. Listen, little girl, is
that any way to thank the person who just saved your life?” the man
exclaimed.
“Huh?” Ally’s eyes adjusted to
the dark and she could see she was in a candlelit room and that a man
with disheveled hair was sitting up and clutching his face. He seemed
to be reaching for a pair of sunglasses which were lying right next
to her. Picking them up, Ally asked, “Why do you have sunglasses
when it’s so dark?”
The man lowered his hands and gazed
at her. Across his eyes, Ally saw a scar which showed where a giant
gash had been cut. At first, Ally thought he must be blind, but he
said, “Thankfully, my eyes were shut and the knife barely cut my
eyelids, so I can still see. But still, I prefer to avoid all the
stares I usually get by wearing these sunglasses.” He put them back
on.
“I see.” Suddenly, she felt a
sharp pain cross her forehead and she let out a gasp as white crossed
her vision and faded again.
“Hey, are you okay? Listen, don’t
sit up, just lie still. You’ve been out for two days with a fever.
You’re lucky that bullet missed your vital organs.”
“Missed?... It... missed?” Ally
bolted up again, shouting, “But Katrina never misses! Why that
little- !”
“Hey, now! Calm down, would you?
You wanna tell me what happened to you? I found you lying half dead
in the sewer.”
“Huh? Oh. Well, lets see. Should I
start from the beginning?”
“I think a short answer will
suffice.”
“Okay, then. I had a showdown with
my sister on the roof and she shot me and I fell into the sewer.”
“....Nevermind. Please start from
the beginning.”
“With pleasure!”
[To all you readers, if you wish to
hear the story that Ally told, go read Catching Ally Cat. Also,
please note that Ally left out any mention of Blake or information
about herself in her telling of the story.]
“Wow. So, I guess that’s why
there are a bunch of criminals running loose now, huh?”
“Yeah- Wait. There are?”
“Don’t tell me you thought that
when you brought down the Organization that all the criminals would
stay snug in their beds until they were officially arrested.”
“...”
“...Thanks for not telling me.”
“No prob.”
“So. Since you’re awake, and you
appear to be in good enough health to punch someone, why don’t you
tell me your name?”
“Ally Kat.”
“Yeah, but isn’t that like your
code name? What’s your real name?”
“How come I’m the only one being
interrogated? Why don’t you say something about yourself?”
“Because I have to be the
mysterious guy that nobody knows anything about.”
“I won't tell you my name until you
tell me yours and why in the world you were in the same sewer as me.”
“Ah... Ahahaha, that. Well, I’m
new to this town and I noticed there were a bunch of criminals
everywhere, so I decided to hide in the sewer until I could decide
who was my ally and who was my enemy. As for my name, it’s Konrad.
Aimery. Now you have to tell me yours.”
“Hmmm... I think I’ll make you
guess. I’ll give you a hint. “Ally” and “Kat” are the
nicknames for my first and middle names.”
“Ally.... Kat....Al... Ally...
Kat....Ally... Ka-....... Alameda.... Kathrine........ Plight.”
“Huh? Do you know me?” Ally asked
excitedly.
“Huh? Um... n-no. I just.... I
think I must have heard the name somewhere before. I don’t remember
when or where though.”
Ally seemed crestfallen. “Oh.”
Konrad seemed slightly shaken, but
quickly shrugged it off. “What are your plans once you’ve fully
healed?”
“Well. I guess I outta catch all
those criminals that are running rampant out there.”
“Would you like some company?”
“Hmm? Ha! Don’t tell me you want
to come along.”
“Well, I’ve got nothing better to
do. I was actually out looking for an adventure. What do you say?
Wanna team up?”
“On what condition...?”
“I’m leader.”
“....Okay, fine. But we need one
more. These criminals aren’t going to stay here. They’re going to
spread out and we need someone who can get us quickly from place to
place.”
“An airship would be nice to have,
but I don’t know anyone who could fly it.”
“Hmph! I know just the guy....”
~A few days later~
“I can walk on my own Kon, I don’t
need you to support me.”
“Okay, okay. Gees, you’re so
feisty.”
Ally rang the doorbell of the
apartment door they stood in front of. Nobody answered. Ally knocked.
She knocked again. She knocked harder. Finally, the door opened and
Ven appeared with drowsy eyes and an alarm clock in his hand which he
seemed to have unplugged and taken with him subconsciously.
“Ven... it’s two in the
afternoon. Shouldn’t you be awake?” Ally asked.
“Oh, hi there, lovely Miss Ally
Kat!” Ven announced enthusiastically, the complete opposite of a
second ago. “Well, it’s like they say, ‘if you don’t have a
job, sleep.’”
“Uh, Ven. Nobody says that.”
“Hmm? Oh, yeah, hahaha!”
“What a weirdo,” Ally mumbled to
herself. Out loud, she said, “Ven, you own an airship now, right?
Didn’t you inherit one from your father?”
“That’s right.”
“Then stop sleeping, because we’ve
got a job for you.”
“We’d like to invite you to join
our team,” Konrad said, holding out his hand.
“Who’s this?”
“Oh, this is Konrad Aimery. He’ll
be the leader of our team.”
“What kind of team is this
exactly?”
“What else? We’re going to create
love and peace throughout the entire world!” Ally said excitedly.
“Love and peace? Oh, boy!” Ven
grabbed Ally’s hands and jumped up and down. “When do we start?
When do we start?”
“Tomorrow, five AM. We’ll meet at
the hanger where your airship is.”
“Yessir! I’ll be there! Yay! Love
and peace throughout the world!” The door shut behind Ven as he
skipped off in preparation.
“See? I told you it would be easy
to convince him.”
“I see....”
~The next day~
“Wow, what an- airship.”
Ally, Konrad and Ven all stood gazing
up at the run down flying machine. Most of the paint had worn off and
there were bits and pieces here and there hanging loose.
“It looks pretty bad on the
outside, but the inside is still in perfectly good shape. If we work
together, we could have this thing painted in no time. Say! We should
put the name of our team on the outside when we paint it. What’s
the name?”
“Name?” Ally and Kon both looked
at each other. “We hadn’t thought of one.”
“Hmm.... Oh! I know! I know! How
about, ‘The Searchers’.”
“What are we searching for?” Ally
asked.
“Criminals!” Ven replied.
“No, no good. We can’t just
search for the criminals, we have to capture them too,” Kon said.
“How about ‘Cops in Disguise’?”
“Ew, no. What kind of name is
that?” Ally objected.
“I’ve got it! I’ve got! ‘The
Defenders of Love and Peace’!” Ven exclaimed.
“No!” Kon and Ally shouted.
“These are all pretty awful. Ally,
any suggestions?” Kon asked.
“With names as awful as we’ve
been suggesting, there’s only one option, because we’ll
eventually be called that no matter what we choose.”
“What’s that?” Ven asked.
“‘GWANAN’.”
“‘Gamen’?” Kon questioned.
“‘GWANAN’.”
“What’s that mean?” Ven
inquired.
“‘GWANAN: Group With A
Notoriously Awful Name’.”
“....”
“...I like it!” Ven exclaimed.
“Yeah.... Strangely, I do too.”
“GWANAN it is!” Ven shouted as he
ran off to buy the paint.
Konrad and Alameda waited for his
return and they all began work on the airship. While Ally washed the
windows, Kon and Ven worked on fixing one of the propellers.
“Hey, Ven. What all do you know
about Ally Kat?”
“Hmm? Not much. I barely met her
myself. But everyone who was a worker in the Organization knows that
she’s the daughter of the guy that formed that thing, and that her
twin sister was running it after their father’s death. Apparently,
Ally was the one to kill her father, but she has no idea herself of
how or why. She lost all her memories prior to coming to this town.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah. She doesn’t even know
where she used to live, so she can’t even check it out or
anything.”
“Wow. So that’s why.”
Meanwhile, Ally Kat stood up on a
high ladder, washing the front window. She couldn’t stop thinking
about the scar across Konrad’s face and how he got it. Suddenly,
white flashed before her once more, and Ally saw a giant, tan colored
house and someone saying, “It’ll be good living in
Hamlin.”“Hamlin?” Ally
thought. “Isn’t that the city right next to here?”
In the distance, she could hear someone calling her name. She felt
like she was falling. Suddenly, she felt something soft. Someone was
calling her name. Over and over it sounded, louder and louder, until
finally she couldn’t hear it any longer and she awoke with a jerk.
She was lying in a cold sweat in her bed in the airship. It was
present time. “Boy. I haven’t seen that dream in a
while. I wonder if it’s because I’ve finally come to Hamlin, my
hometown?” Ally thought to
herself. She got up. It was about three in the morning. Softly
walking down the hall, she came to Konrad’s room and knocked. There
was no answer. Opening the door, she peaked in and discovered that
Konrad still wasn’t back yet. “Where could he have
gone?”
Suddenly, a realization
came upon her and she quickly threw on her coat and rushed out the
door.
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