WELCOME

[Beta]

Date: 2/3/10

Time: (local) 1000 (tokyo) 1900


Beta frowned, no matter how you looked at it; there was nothing fun about packing.


She frowned as she reached over her fish to collect the myriad books she had on their care and physiology. They wiggled and shinned in the clear water of their tanks, they were presented in the traditional style of a simply glass bowl with only colored pebbles providing any decoration. Beta had felt certain however her antics kept them entertained through their brief existences.


She sighed; she rather hated the not knowing aspect of Wammy’s House. They were trying to teach you how to deduce anything through reason or logic yet they kept secrets from you at every turn. She’d only just received the e-mail that she has to be completely packed by 6pm and had received no other information. Was she being punished, rewarded? Was she being sent away for another aspect of her training? She sighed, irritably blowing a loose strand of black hair from her face, for how intelligent she supposedly was she couldn’t deduce exactly why she was being asked to do this.


She had a theory however, the number one student had been moved first, and this implied either a training program or some sort of survival maneuver. It had hit the news that only a few days ago L had died, and now she, the number two, was being asked to pack? They were 78% likely to be attempting to save her. Did they suspect that Kira was already moving against them? Yet what would Kira want with Wammy’s House? L was dead, there was no one for them to emulate anymore. Couldn’t he see that? Or was Roger just being paranoid?


She dumped the books into the box with a loud series of thuds. She briefly thought of her room mate Archetype, the girl was pretty interesting. She’d been number one once but had forced herself back down. Beta smirked, let the girl deny it, Beta knew you had to act stupid to go from being number one to the last in such a brief amount of time. Once again Beta didn’t know what had driven this inexplicable academic suicide, but she’d been intending to find out.


Another mystery left unsolved on the way to apparently an even greater one, and Beta so hated loose ends.

[Archetype]

Archetype trudged back to her bedroom. She had spent the last three hours reading through her notes from chemistry class and trying her hardest to keep the information in her head. These last few months of her constant slacking had done more damage than she would have guessed. Her study habits had even taken a fatal blow. Her once sharp knack for memorization seemed to have faded along with any hope of ever succeeding L.

L. The man that she had never met, but that she had been so determined once to become had passed away only a few days prior. Kira’s new spokesperson had made a public announcement to that fact, and A still couldn’t believe it. The man had seemed to untouchable; so much like a God. In the real world, Kira reigned over the people as an omnipotent being, but at Wammy’s House, L was their only savior.

Learning of L’s failure only made Archetype want to try even harder to regain her rank. If she could become number 1 again, then maybe Roger would put her in charge of the Kira case. ‘No,’ she thought. ‘Don’t get your hopes up. You fucked up, you’ll never be L. You need to accept this.’

Accepting something as hard as this was tough, but she was intelligent enough to know that there was no use dwelling on it. Thoughts like that led to depression, and she’d be damned if she ended up in the same position as her namesake.

Archetype shifted her notebook to her other hand to open her bedroom door. Her roommate, Beta, seemed to be packing her things. She narrowed her eyes a bit in concentration. Could this have something to do with L’s death? The girl was ranked second; perhaps she’d been called in to work on the case. There was no way that she was running away. Despite the fact that the two girls rarely spoke about anything that wasn’t homework related, she knew that Beta would never give up so easily.

She grunted a “good morning,” before walking past the girl and depositing her books on her poorly made bed. She smoothed out the hem of her t-shirt before sitting down beside her notes, watching the girl carefully.

“Are you going somewhere?” she tried to not sound interested, but she couldn’t help but feel a tinge of jealousy at the thought that somehow this girl was getting the chance to succeed L that she would never get.

[Beta]

Beta glanced over her shoulder as her room mate walked in, and didn’t suppress a smile. Archetype was tolerable even if she’d never been fun, but she was interesting at least. Beta already knew there was a lot more going on up there than the other girl let on. She had a suspicion that the other orphan was jealous of her, something she found amusing, though she knew better than to express this as it only upset Archetype. Having your room mate peeved at you was not a good idea. She idly nibbled on the finger of her glove on her left hand at the question given she could no longer raise the right one to her mouth. To believe someone envied her.


“I suspect it’s a secret but…” Beta stepped closer like with her hands behind her back and leaned forward as if she and Archetype were best friends indulging in gossip. “I am leaving but I don’t know why or where.”


She straightened her back and tossed some hair over her shoulder. She glanced out the window.


“I think it has something to do with Kira, but really, why go so far? I liked it here,” she said with a sigh. “I know how everything works; I can’t guarantee that at this next place.”


She looked back at Archetype raising an eyebrow, daring the girl to be just as candid with her. Such was her way, she liked to prod and tease but never aggressively or maliciously. She just wanted a little bit of truth.

[Archetype]

So, she was leaving. But to not even know where you were going? Why would the heads of Wammy’s pull such a stunt? ‘Wait. Of course. Kira killed L, no doubt they’re moving those of us who could possibly succeed him to another place to work on the case.’ If there was one thing that Wammy’s did well, it was to hide everything under a very fine layer of secrecy.

She bit the inside of her lip as the other girl cocked an eyebrow at her. She wasn’t rubbing this in her face, Beta wasn’t the type to do anything like that. Was she looking for input on the situation? Did she really value Archetype’s feedback?

Or was she scared?

“Oh,” was all she ended up replying. She knew that she should prod further, but instead she turned her attention to the window that Beta had just been looking out of. She took in the way that the early morning sun was creating the tiniest shadows under the leaves of the trees outside of the window, calculating just what position it would need to be in the sky in order to create them. All matter created shadows, a place for light to hide under, and she had spent too much time hiding in those shadows.

“Well, I wish you the best of luck,” she finally said, picking up her notes and carrying them back to her desk, hoping that Beta wouldn’t press the issue any further. If she wanted to be able to wear that same excited expression that her roommate had someday, she would need to study more.

[Beta]

Beta’s brow furrowed at the answer. It sounded like the truth, but it was far more succinct than what she’d wanted. How did A really feel about her leaving? Did she resent her, was she happy she was going? Or was she just indifferent? Beta didn’t care to be thought of so negatively. Still what could she do? It was highly unlikely she was getting another chance with the girl.

“Ah well thank-“ she startled as her response was cut off by a shriek down the hall. She turned quickly on her heel and stared out the door. “Was?”

“Mr Roger is dead!” someone, the voice sounded female, cried out into the hall. Beta tensed, Mr Roger is an old man, could he really be dead though? Perhaps he just collapsed. She hadn’t cared for Roger, he wasn’t amusing, but he was still the mentor of the House. Thus he was center of their chaotic vortex of egos and competition.

“Call an ambulance!” one voice shouted above the rushed foot fall and murmur of other voices. Beta trembled and stepped back to steady herself with the windowsill. She was trained in first aide but so were many of the others. She would just be another by-stander of no use at all. She glanced out her window to take her mind off the upsetting situation. She frowned; those three white vans hadn’t been there a few minutes ago. Were they pedestrian vehicles? They certainly weren’t the emergency services as the ambulance had just been called. How ironic they should arrive just as Roger may lay dying, almost as it they knew about it.

Knew about it? The only way one could know about it is if they pre-meditated the death, and only Kira could do that in this situation. Indeed this forced relocation of mine has the probability of 78% that it is directly from fear of Kira, she mused. Then gasped, and realized perhaps Roger was not the fool she’d always thought he was. As one man stepped out from the van, with his face covered, she knew what was coming next. She quickly turned to address the girl who was hopefully still in the room.

“Archetype! We have to find a way to cover our faces from tear gas!” she cried.

[Archetype]

Archetype ignored the other girl’s gratitude. While she didn’t have any reason to be upset with her, she certainly wasn’t happy for her. She tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear, bringing her attention back to her desk as a voice called out from the hallway.

“Roger?” she said, scooting her chair back and standing up. Roger wasn’t an important person in any way to Archetype, and she doubted she would shed tears over the old man, but a death was still a death. Every living creature dies, and the world had certainly seen its fair share lately. She walked to the doorway and peeked out into the hallway. A number of children had already gathered, and while she wanted nothing but to attempt to save his life, she restrained herself. One of the higher ranked children was no doubt already working on him.

She took a few steps back into the room braced herself against the wall. This wasn’t the time to panic, she needed to-

Her thoughts were cut off by Beta. Tear gas? Archetype ran to the window, taking in the sight of a man in a mask standing beside three unmarked white trucks and deduced very quickly what was about to happen.

“Fuck!” she screamed, grabbing a towel from this morning’s laundry and handing it to Beta. “Tie this around your face and run!” she yelled before turning back to the basket and grabbing one for herself. Before she had a chance to see if Beta had finished tying it or not, she grabbed the girl’s hand and pulled her out into the hall, wrapping her own towel around her nose and mouth as she ran.

It didn’t matter what was going on, why Roger had died or why these vans were parked outside. The only thing that mattered now was survival.

[Beta]

To unload a force large enough to subdue the population of Wammy’s House it will take approximately three minutes. It will take approximately two minutes to deploy the gas. I calculate a five to six minute window to escape, Beta surveyed as she tied her towel around her face. Beta was in survival mode, her mind was an electrifying charge of figures, possibilities, and percentages. It was why she had survived the night of the fire and not her sister or parents. Beta could slip into her rational mind and lose herself as chaos submerged her surroundings. Perhaps there was good reason after all she was number two.

The other children were doomed, they had not reacted quickly enough and she could not hope to make them react quickly enough. She grasped tightly onto A, she was the only one who may also survive, Beta couldn’t be assured she could save her, but she desperately needed an ally.

Going down stairs will take too long and they will already have the house surrounded by the time we get to the end of the stairs. There is only a 5% chance we would die from a fall from the back hall window, and a 40% chance we would sustain an immobilizing injury, this can be downgraded to 20% if we make certain to fall on our posteriors. She calculated, and she tugged on the other girl.

“We have to jump!” she said and pulled her towards the window. Of course if A dug her heels in Beta would release her. She like the other girl to escape as well but this was a matter of seconds, she couldn’t afford a hesitation. The towels would provide only a very brief respite against tear gas. Once the gas seeped in, their chance would be lost.

[Archetype]

Archetype held tight to the other girl as the two dashed through the hallways. ‘Which way should we go?’ she thought, keeping her feet in motion. Going down the stairs would take too long, and if the men in the vans started on this side of the orphanage, they would be walking right into the worst of it. But running to the other side meant suicide as well.

She felt herself get tugged to a stop and glanced up at Beta. Jumping made sense, and from this high up, there was little chance that they would be killed, and at the very least they would have a better chance to escape this way. Archetype jumped in front and unlatched the window, pushing it open with all of her weight. She glanced down, suddenly realizing just how high up it really was.

She glanced behind herself, watching the other children still huddling together and fretting over Roger. There was no rescuing them now, she could barely rescue herself. Her nerve thoroughly lost, she turned to the other girl. “You first,” she muttered, stepping aside and trying to make it appear as though she was helping instead of hindering their escape.

[Beta]

Beta paused as Archetype stepped aside, an eyebrow raised. She quickly looked away however; she didn’t have the time to deliberate on other’s motives. They only had two minutes now. She climbed onto the sill and pushed off with her arms, careful to land on her rump and not her legs onto the soft ground below; at least a rain two days before would have softened the point of impact. She closed her eyes during the five second fall as distant memories of heat at her back, the acrid smell of smoke choking her, and her sister’s inarticulate cries piercing the night assaulted her as she sped down wards.

Her horrified revere was broken however as she landed, the wind knocked out of her and the jolt made her bite her tongue open. She quickly climbed to her feet and began running as the sounds of broken glass followed her. She didn’t look back; her eyes were trained on reaching the back gate and getting over it before the invaders made their way to the back of the house. If Archetype was following her excellent, if not then it was a shame but not a reason to stop. She’d tried to save at least once of her class mates, far more than many of them would have done.

And after? And after? she wondered as she pumped her legs across the wet grass and the cold air raked across her face and hair. For once her mind was blank and she had no answers. The body was fixated on carrying her away from danger.

[Archetype]

Once Beta had successfully made the jump to the ground, Archetype felt much better about attempting it herself. She was still frightened, but she swallowed her fear and climbed onto the sill, making sure to fall in the same manner that Beta had. The sound of broken glass followed her all of the way to the ground. The landing was rough, the breath knocked out of her as pain coursed up her back. She climbed to her feet, keeping her eyes trained on the retreating back of the girl in front of her.

She didn’t understand what was going on, the only thing on her mind was getting as far as humanly possible away from the building for now. Amazed at how fast her feet were moving, she reached the gate almost at the same time as Beta. It was tall, but not so bad that they wouldn’t be able to jump it. Without pausing, she leapt up and grabbed the top of the gate, attempting to pull herself over.

She grunted harshly as she pulled, the pain in her back becoming more apparent, and vaguely wondered if Beta had already made it over the gate.