Chapter 47: Standard Issue
"Official welcome to White Tower."
Fin stood in front of Ethan and broke into a wide smile, looking him up and down with the easy approval of someone who had decided to be pleased before the conversation even started.
"That girlfriend of yours really can pull some strings. Honorary title?" He shook his head slowly, something between admiration and exasperation moving across his face. "I didn’t get that amount of pay when I joined. Ahhh, to have a backer."
Ethan said nothing to that immediately.
As a new member of White Tower, he was guaranteed a standard set of tools and materials, processed and distributed the same way for every incoming member regardless of how they had arrived at the role.
The standard issued weapon of choice came first. Ethan chose a crossbow, the same basic design as the Elderan bow he was already familiar with, but with a few additional tweaks built into the mechanism that improved on what he already knew.
A signal patch followed, small and unassuming, capable of sending a distress signal instantly anywhere within human territory.
Then a set of spells, including legacy spells such as White Transit alongside several auxiliary options he hadn’t held before, and a badge of notice confirming his membership in the organization.
He turned each item over in his hands as it was placed in front of him, cataloguing without comment.
"Backer, huh."
He could only smile at the word.
Did he really have a backer. From where he stood, Hela was almost certainly planning something unpleasant for the next time she had him alone, and her mother had made her feelings about him clear from the moment she landed on the turtle’s back three weeks ago. Neither of those facts fit cleanly inside the word Fin kept using.
(The arrangement was useful. That was the extent of it.)
"Well, it’s fine." Fin winked at him, already turning toward the far end of the building and walking without waiting to be followed. "One day I’ll get myself a powerful backer like you."
Ethan kept the smile in place and fell into step behind him.
,,,,,,,,,,,,,
The briefing room was quiet when they entered.
Ethan looked around and made a quick head count. Six people already seated, excluding himself and Fin, all of them waiting with the settled patience of people who had done this enough times to stop filling the silence before they had to.
At the front of the room stood the man in the white hat, the same one who had captured Servos back at the compound.
"Okay. We’re complete now."
He beckoned them forward as they entered, waiting until they had taken their seats before turning to the map mounted on the wall behind him.
"Tona Town. West of the stronghold, in the peripheries of the Windgrave mountain range."
His voice was even, carrying the kind of practiced clarity that came from delivering briefings often enough to strip everything unnecessary out of them.
"It’s a small docking and mining town. People working in the mountains come there to rest."
He let that sit for a moment before continuing.
"For three weeks now, we’ve been getting reports of giant lizard attacks on the roads in and out of the town. As of yesterday, the first attack inside the town itself was recorded."
If he had been available when the reports first came in he would have dispatched a team then. But White Tower’s reach was wide, and the organization was stretched thin across too many simultaneous responsibilities. Things had slipped through the window longer than they should have.
That said, Tona Town was too close to Windgrave’s second headquarters for this to continue without a response.
It was embarrassing. Beast activity of this scale, operating this close to White Tower’s own walls, and left unresolved for three weeks. The fact that they had new recruits coming in at tier 7 at the very least made the situation manageable. But it still needed to be handled.
"Our job is to secure the town first," the man in the white hat continued, his eyes moving across the room. "Then locate the source these giant lizards are coming from, and exterminate it."
He reached for a stack of papers on the table beside him and began distributing them across the room, a single set placed in front of each member.
"These briefs contain information on the type of creatures we’ll be facing. If you’d like to prepare, use the time you have. We move out at dusk this evening."
He set the remaining papers down and dismissed the room with a gesture.
Chairs shifted. People stood, collecting their documents, conversations starting up in low voices as they moved toward the door.
Ethan took his brief and followed the group out into the corridor.
"Ethan!!"
He stopped.
The voice came from beside him, and before he could fully turn toward it, arms wrapped around him in a full embrace that left no room for response.
A chill moved down his spine in a single clean line.
He looked left. He looked right.
Fin stood off to the side, hands in his pockets, gaze directed pointedly at the ceiling. He had started whistling something low and tuneless, his entire posture arranged to communicate that he had not seen anything, was not seeing anything, and had no interest in seeing anything.
He wasn’t stupid enough to step into whatever existed between these two sisters.
Ethan recognized her.
He had only seen her once before, and under circumstances that made her impossible to forget regardless of how much time passed. She was still holding on, her arms locked around him with an enthusiasm that didn’t seem to register the awkwardness radiating off him in every direction.
He stood very still and accepted his situation.
(He would deal with this.)
His eyes drifted once more toward Fin, who had found something extremely interesting to look at further down the corridor and shown no sign of returning.
Ethan exhaled slowly through his nose.
His first official mission with White Tower hadn’t even started yet.
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