Welcome to Gaia! ::

Yuurei brushed her purple hair out of her eyes as she pulled another beaker from the counter into the sink. The hot water bellowed up in a cloud of steam as it hit the beaker and began to rid it of the bright green congealed substance within. Yuurei, with her thick rubber gloves on, prodded the dissolving liquid as she washed it away. Her small butterflox Sammy, the first of her kind, flapped her wings to remain perched on Yuurei’s head. “Oh, come on,” scolded Yuurei. “You’re not a hat!” Sammy, seemingly deaf to Yuurei’s chastising, remained where she was, despite the fact that Yuurei shook her head in an attempt to rid her makeshift hat.

Yuurei heard a crunching of tires on her gravel driveway. Looking out the window Yuurei saw a delivery truck driving towards her house. As the truck pulled up to the peak of the circular driveway Yuurei left her view from the window above the sink and walked to her foyer. She opened her front door as the plain looking man stepped out of the truck. Of average height and weight with brown hair and eyes there was nothing notable about this man – except that he had a black briefcase in his left hand.

The man gave her a once over before asking, “Miss Yuurei?” in a deep bass voice. Yuurei smiled and nodded her head as he held out the receipt for her to sign. Out of the corner of her eye, Yuurei saw her cat, Omen, running around to the front of her house, chasing a butterfly. She must have thought it was something like Sammy annoying her, thought Yuurei with an inward smile.

“Here you go!” Yuurei said to the deliveryman as she handed him the pen and paper. The man took it and handed her the black briefcase. The briefcase was surprisingly heavy, despite the fact that they were normally used for paperwork. Nodding to the man, Yuurei turned back towards her house. What could this be? None of my normal packages ever come in briefcases. . . thought Yuurei.

As the man pressed his foot on the gas Yuurei whipped around and screamed “No!” already knowing what was going to happen before it did. The bounce of the tires as it rolled over the fluff of black fur did not stop Yuurei from picturing Omen as the two-month-old kitten she was when she got her. She was running all over the house, learning to become her familiar. Two months later she was helping Yuurei in the basement with various experiments.

As the red break lights blinked to brightness Yuurei was brought back to the present as she ran over towards her cat. “I’m so sorry, ma’am” said the delivery man, visibly shaken. Yuurei nodded, knowing before she even looked that Omen was not alive anymore. As the man wrapped the corpse in an overshirt he had in his truck Yuurei took the package. She was numb, not realizing that she was still gripping the briefcase in her left hand.

After deciding to be guardian to the Raevan entrusted to her, Yuurei heard a soft mewing and a scratching at the side of the table. What the hell is that?! Yuurei looked around. “Omen is dead. She’s not alive she can’t help me here” Yuurei said out loud to calm her nerves. Checking to be sure again that there was no cat in the basement, Yuurei heard, again, a soft mewing. Then she saw it: the indent, inside the soft lining of the briefcase, of a weight being pressed upon it. She saw the indent shift and jump to another area next to the note from Kyou. The invisible thing began swatting at the paper, shifting it to different areas on the table. Visibly shaking, her voice quivering and tears in her eyes, Yuurei did what she always did when Omen would get too rowdy when they were working. “Omen,” she said in a low voice. “We’re working. It’s not playtime.” The paper suddenly stopped moving and she felt a pressure on her leg as she always did after she said those sentences, when Omen would stop playing and rub against her leg, physically transferring pheromones and claiming ownership, but also showing affection. This was, of course, when Omen was alive.

“Let’s work, Omen,” she said like she always did after scolding the familiar. Yuurei scanned the letter again. Use the enclosed soul bottle to collect a soul. Did Yuurei miss Omen? – yes. Did she want her back? – of course. Would she ensure that Omen’s spirit would be reborn in the form of a raevan? She didn’t know. Yuurei heard a soft mewing. Omen’s soul was sad, mournful and obviously upset. Though she had died she would not leave Yuurei because she was supposed to care for the human. She was supposed to help her with experiments. Omen nuzzled against Yuurei’s outstretched hand and Yuurei, not seeing the cat, felt the pressure of the spirit’s head. Yuurei made a decision. “Why don’t you wait here, Omen?” Yuurei said. “I will get you some milk and bring it down here for you.”

Yuurei used the elevator, went up to the kitchen and filled a bowl with milk. Taking the bowl downstairs Yuurei set the bowl of milk on the floor next to the area where Omen usually slept. Once the milk started being lapped at, shown by the slowly lowering of the level of milk as well as small circles that developed around an invisible disturbance in the liquid. Yuurei smiled and then gently placed the soul bottle she was given between Omen’s bed and the bowl of milk. “You won’t suffer between two worlds for too long,” Yuurei said softly.

Another Delivery Service

Yuurei needs to get in touch with Dr. Kyou because she captured Omen's soul. What will Kyou say about her capturing her kitten familiar's soul?

BEEP. . . . . . . BEEP . . . . . . . BEEP . . . . . The intermittent beeping displayed six messages on her answering machine. Yuurei had notified everyone that she was visiting family members all over Gaia and going to the beach for a long two month vacation. Who could have called her?

"Message One" "Hello. Congratulations. You have won a free cruise to scenic Gambino Islands. Please call us back with your credit card number for a small insurance deposit of one tho . . ." [BEEEEEP]

Yuurei rolled her eyes as she pushed the delete button.

"Message Two" "Hey Yuurei! Where have you been lately? This is Ames. Give me a call when you get a chance, babe. Lata!" DATE: March 1

Yuurei squinted her eyes and deleted the message.

"Message Three" "This is a phone call for Amanda Larson from Financial Creditors Gaia. Ple . . . [BEEEEEP]

Deleted.

"Message Four" "Hello Yuurei, this is Dr. Kyou. I wanted to call and let you know that your raevan is finally here. She is ready to be picked up when you're ready. Please give me a call at . . . so we can arrange a pickup. Thank you." DATE : March 26

"Message Five" "Hello Yuurei-dono. This is a message from Lab 305. Your raevan will be staying with Chloe Star until you get back to us. Please call as soon as possible. Her phone number here is . . . " DATE: April 1

"Message Six" "Hey 'Rei. This is your sister. Just calling to make sure that you got home safely. Give me a call when you get this. Muah!"


"Oh my god! Omen!" Yuurei grabbed the telephone and dialed the number for Chloe.

Lucia had finally explored her new home completely. So this was Nana Lucia’s place. . . she thought. She decided that the home was gorgeous. Enough modern amenities updated the Victorian era house. Her favorite room was definitely the library. Lucia would read one book and go onto another. She never put them back exactly as they were, but she couldn’t stop reading.

Her room, however, was very plain. Before she had arrived, Yuurei had whitewashed the walls and ceiling, leaving only the dark wood of the floor. The room seemed awkward. Especially when she looked out the French door onto the balcony she shared with the guest bedroom. The black floor merged into the black wrought iron railing. Her room, she decided, should match her personality.

The ceiling, she decided, should look like a night sky, complete with a inset light as a full moon in the sky. Her walls would be a light purple and the dark floor would be bare. Her bed would have the most comfortable mattress because she loved to nap.

White satin sheets and quilt-cover would decorate the full bed with a wrought iron headboard. That way the bed was the center focus of everything. Above the desk would be a shelf with a few books of her own. A dresser to match the floor would be placed in the closet to hide it. A wrought iron nightstand would be next to the bed.

Lucia looked around her newly decorated room and decided she liked it. She would need to put up pretty pictures, like Yuurei had everywhere, but the room was simple, elegant and comfortable to her. As she settled on her cool sheets she looked up at her night sky ceiling and curled up for a nap.

Yuurei said that since I can write I should probably start using this as a journal. She said she would do the same, when she had time; though, because she suggested it, I'm reluctant. She suggested it to me a few weeks ago and I have completely ignored it until now, but I figure it's a good way to keep track of my thoughts. And I can do this free-writing thing I read about in one of the books in the library upstairs. I wish I was allowed to sleep up there. I like how I decorated my room, but I love the library. With all of the windows I can see the woods, the ocean, and everything else around the house. Free-writing is basically when you take paper and pencil and just write and write. Anything that comes to your mind. Anything at all. So that's what I'm doing now, I guess. I had a lot of fun at the beach. Rivener was really nice and I guess you'd call him cute? Either way, I like how he looks. I didn't like that Aphismet kept making him go away, even at the end. But at least he was given time to say goodbye decently. Pasha was nice too! She was the first raevan to be nice to me. I thought they would all be like Roux and Lucretia at first, but I'm glad I was wrong. Pasha's guardian was nice to me too -- she made me feel like I do when I get really hungry, but it went away a bit after we traded drinks. I think I forgot to take the pretty umbrella out of the drink she gave me when we switched. I wanted to take it home. I'm glad I was able to help Pasha at the fire. She seemed to feel better when we decided to go visit Zave. I hope she remembers to bring me too. I felt really good when I was able to teach him how to go under the limbo bar. I think Zave (Pasha called him Zavier?) was happy I could teach him too. I don't know what happened, but I hope he did good at limbo, and wasn't too disappointed when his teacher hit the bar and fell. I'm glad Rivener didn't get a picture of that. Well it's getting late and I really need to eat. I think I'll just go out into the woods to Yuurei's miniature pet cemetery. She said her family had been burying loved animals back there for centuries. I have to say my favorite cemetery is the one with Nana Lucia. On her stone there is a quote that says, "Tis not the whole of life to live nor all of death to die." I wonder what that means. Living is living and dying is dying. The animal souls I've seen vanish just pop out of life. Gone.

Grease Monkeys

Characters: Josh, Yuurei, Lucia
Place: Gambino Vehicle Restorative on Gambino Isle
Time: Late Evening (around 8pm)
Weather: A warm evening after a beautiful day, the sun is setting and is already at the horizon

Who knew that a simple car servicing would lead to meeting another raevan owner? Lucia finds out about the raevan birds and bees while Josh and Yuurei let the mechanics be Grease Monkeys.

The lonely light could have been from a light house. It kept being obscured, as if it was spinning around and facing away from the water like the rotating light that spanned the shore to warn off boats that might be getting too close to land. However, rather than spinning, the light was intermittently shadowed by a figure that seemed to be pacing back and forth from one side of the room to the other. A pause in the pacing and the lighthouse light was suddenly dimished. Though the moon was full, the lack of artificial light hid the figure who had turned off the lights as she slipped out onto the balcony attached to her room.

The girl looked over the wrought iron railing at the height she would be jumping from and took a deep breath, stealing herself for the fall and thud she was sure would happen. Her neck would break, the light would fade and there would be nothing more. But that wasn't what happened when someone died. Still, she didn't want to experience death. Grasping the railing, her fingers were white. Pushing herself up and dragging her ribbon to the other side of the railing her ears twitched and wings flapped slightly as she prepared for the fall. Spinning her body around to face the house, the cat-girl pushed her upper body and ribbon away from the rails. Clenching her eyes closed, Lucia flapped her wings frantically, expecting to slide down the rails with amazing speed, lose her grip and fall to her death. Finding herself floating upwards instead, Lucia tightened her grip on the railing and slowed her beating wings. Slowly Lucia allowed herself to float downward. Griping the outside wall of the house she slowly drifted downward like a feather just released by the wind. When she was her normal height, the cat-girl-raevan released her hold on the house and breathed a sigh of relief. After hours waiting, Yuurei had finally gone to bed. Once the reflection of the light in her room could no longer be seen on the grass, Lucia had decided it was time to sneak out. She didn’t really have a plan for where to go, but she liked the thrill of doing something no one knew about. Somewhere where no one could keep tabs on her or annoy her with pestering complaints.

Lucia looked up at the sky and then to the original scene that drew her outwards. The moon was large in the sky and Lucia could see the pot-hole like texture of the mountains, plateaus, and other masses on the surface. The silvery blue light of the moon lit up the grass so that, rather than being the bright green it typically was, the lawn had a blue tint to it causing the grass to look more like the shimmery surface of the moon as seen from Earth. Turning her eyes away from the grass and the moon, Lucia’s eyes locked on the silvery sand that was typically a soft yellow, and the dark reflective surface of the quietly rolling sea. Out in the distance, fish were jumping out of the water at inconsistent intervals. This was the scene that drew her out. The glassy water was interrupted only by the quiet roll of a wave coming in and the occasional splash of a fish jumping out and then flopping back into the water. Floating over the water, Lucia was high enough to be sure that no frivolous splash of water would touch even the belt buckle of her ribbon.

The ectoplasm raevan did not want to catch the fish (what would she do with them after all?), but their movements intrigued her, drew her closer, made her want to know more about them and see their movements close up, even to compare them to fish in the daylight. These silvery animals seemed different in the moonlight, though it might have just been their time of year to mate and reproduce. Lucia took her time, watching the fish, observing the two pairs that continued jumping out of the water at random. Lucia didn't have the knowledge to know which might be females and which might be males. So she imagined that two were females and two were males. The females were jumping upward, displaying their shiny scales in the moonlight to intrigue the males. The males, in response, were soaring out of the water to impress the women. Underneath the water was where the romance would go on. Above was for showing off and getting attention.

The reflection of the moon moving towards the shore both with the waves rolling under it and the hour and a half that had passed just observing the fish. Around three in the morning, the moon's reflection caused her eyes to follow it instead. And looking up she noticed how silvery and brilliant the forest looked in the moonlight. Abandoning the fish, Lucia floated inland and into the depth of the forest, traveling the familiar path towards the pet cemetery that housed Omen. The cat raevan smiled as she noted that the clearing in the woods from the mini cemetery allowed the circle of moonlight to fall on the graves. Lucia did not stop to eat, but continued through the woods, admiring the moonlight the flickered through the leaves and rested on the stream as she followed it towards her first encounter with her powers. Since that time she had been visiting the local hospital helping sick, or mostly dying people: the only humans she cared about. She had also been helping animal souls the best she could. The dying humans seemed to benefit from the life in her. Not by getting well, but by being at peace. If they needed anything, she did her best to help them. The animal’s needs after death were simpler, and she could manage to help them after their deaths. Humans were more complex. She did the best to help them before they died. She always seemed to know which ones were going to die soon and though it made her sad, she felt contentment knowing that as they died, they did not need to remain on earth, but could move on to . . . wherever they went.

Lucia wandered so far into the woods that she eventually reached the other side. Looking around, she recognized the area as the road to Gambino Isle and decided that since she was almost there, she should visit Nana Lucia and, suddenly very hungry, eat in the isle’s cemetery. Floating slowly down across the bridge and onto the island, Lucia headed straight for the cemetery. The gates were all locked, but the raevan closed her eyes tightly, flapped her wings quickly to go up, forward over the gate and slowly lowered herself. Only at her normal height with the end of her ribbon lightly brushing the ground did she open her eyes again, now inside the cemetery.

The kitten-girl-raevan floated through the large cemetery the familiar path to Nana Lucia’s grave. On the path she normally took, however, she encountered something she had never seen before. The large mound of freshly replaced dirt caught her attention, but not as much as the angry soul above it. Normally souls of the dead appeared as the soul wished to look. Rather than as an old woman or a sickly middle age man, the spirits were young and appeared as they looked at their happiest time in life. An old woman's soul, who died in the hospital, appeared to be a beautiful woman on her wedding day. A middle aged man who she saw once became a youthful teenager wearing a tuxedo and a boutonniere ready for prom night. A child who had been raped and murdered appeared not as a battered girl, but as the beautiful child she was before her death.

Lucia gasped at the visage before her. She did not understand why a soul would view itself as it died, but there had to be a reason. The man before her was in his mid thirties. His face was gaunt and had he not been angry or injured, he would have been handsome. His long face and roguish dark brown hair fit his casual preppy style. However, the blood on his clothes, multiple cuts through the cloth from stabbings, bruising on his cheeks, and the long dark red slice across his neck did not. The raevan did not move a muscle but only stared at what was before her in confusion. She did not understand why this man would look this way. She glanced, only with her eyes, at the name. Jacob Matthew Swift. She had, she realized, read about the brutal but unsolved murder of the up and coming businessman. His head, with her subtle eye movement back to him, turned suddenly and his eyes locked on her. They had an anger behind them and Lucia saw no love, pleading, or desperation that usually came from the souls she helped. Some had been in brutal circumstances, some even worse than that of this man, but he looked at her with such hate that she forgot that he was unable to touch her and she feared for her own life. ”YOU b***h! ******** WHORE! HOW COULD YOU DO THIS TO ME! I GAVE YOU EVERYTHING YOU WANTED!” The man yelled at her in a raspy voice as he began striding towards her. Lucia let out a yelp and backed up as far as she could. She was weak with hunger and wanted the security of Nana Lucia’s grave, but the man held her in fear, unable to move. ”ARE YOU ******** HAPPY YOU SLUT!?! YOU WHORE!” The man yelled. He was quickly closing the distance between them and only by hearing the clank of her belt buckle against the grave behind her did Lucia become mobile. Lucia gasped as she looked at him and streaked towards Nana Lucia’s grave. She heard he calls and cursing as he followed her. Don’t look back. He doesn’t want help. Get to Nana Lucia. Get to Nana Lucia. Get to Nana Lucia. Almost there, Lucia looked back as the soul reached out to push her to the ground, his hands going through her back. <******** SLUT. YOU GOT WHAT YOU WANTED NOW!!! WELL YOU'RE GONNA GET WHAT YOU HAVE COMING! The raevan reached Lucia’s grave, crouched down and turned around. ”I’m not who you think I am! My name is Lucia and I’m a raevan!” She scrunched up her shoulders, trying to protect her neck instinctually. “BULLSHIT! ******** WHORE!” Jacob lifted up his hand and brought it down across Lucia’s face. While ghosts usually were unable to touch her unless she initiated the contact, this hand reached its target. Unprepared for the impact Lucia’s head slammed, unsupported, into the stone of her makeshift great-grandmother. Without any strength, the kitten-raevan passed out and Jacob slid his body, or at least his upper body, into hers.

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Lucia was not herself. She was her, but she wasn’t in her self. Her body was not her own. Laying on a soft bed, her legs felt the warm cloth beneath her. The woman in front of her was slowly stripping down, cooing soft sexual desires and whispers in Lucia’s unwilling ear. With long dark hair and deep blue, almost purple eyes, the woman sort of reminded Lucia of herself, only human. She couldn’t control the body she was in. As the woman stripped down to her bra, rubbing Lucia’s flat chest, the flat chest of Jacob, her demeanor changed and she backed off, a wide smile playing across her lips as the man holding the long knife walked into the expensive hotel room and grabbed Jacob. He stabbed the knife into Jacob’s chest over and over. Jacob, unprepared for the attack, did not react at first. The man was stabbing Jacob. Stabbing Lucia. She was screaming and trying to flail, not because she herself was dying, but because she felt what he did. The pain, the horror of seeing the blood seeping out of the wounds on her flat male chest, the suddenly reversed arousal the young raevan knew nothing about. Suddenly the masked man flicked the knife upwards and Lucia’s throat with the strange adam’s apple began to feel warm and Lucia found herself unable to scream anymore as the blood trickled down her chest. The woman strode from across the room, kissed the dying Jacob and then punched him in the face. Jacob’s eyes grew lifeless and the masked man was satisfied as he pulled the woman who looked so similar yet so different from Lucia into a passionate kiss. As Jacob’s vision died, and with it Jacob, Lucia saw the murderous couple become more passionate. The woman pulled the murder’s mask up --

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With the quick glimpse of the face, Lucia was pulled back into reality. Her head was throbbing, but her hands flew up to her throat and found her own neck intact. Jacob was looking at her, not with hatred from before, because he too had seen the differences between the woman who helped kill him and the young raevan he had jumped to conclusions about. The raevan before him was not his occasional lover and murderer, the woman he was cheating on his wife with, but was a beautiful woman of a different species. Jacob found he had no words of apology. What could be said to make up for screaming the obesentities at her, believeing that she had been his lover when she obviously had no parts to make love to. He nodded at her apologetically, "I'm sorry. I well, you know what I thought". Lucia nodded, breathing heavily trying to see through her throbbing head and cloudy vision, and trying to grasp what had happened. As Jacob realized who his murderer had been, he was at peace. Maybe the case wasn’t solved, but he knew for sure; and he was certain that nothing positive would come for him or Victoria. As Jacob selfishly walked away from the injured Lucia intent on killing his murderers if possible, Lucia’s hunger and throbbing head seemed to double. As she tried to concentrate on eating, she passed out again, this time dreamlessly.



”Honey, are you okay?” An elderly woman peered down at the purple raevan as she slept against the headstone. ”Sweetie, wake up!” The woman was petting the raevan’s hair, trying to rouse her. Lucia’s eyes flitted open, slowly taking in the sweet smiling face and bright blue eyes before her. ” Sweetheart you’re in a cemetery. You wake up while I’m visiting Murphy over here and I’ll make sure you’re okay before I leave.” Lucia nodded absentmindedly at the kindly woman visiting a neighboring grave. She tried to figure out if the events of the night before were real or her imagination. They must have been real, because her head still hurt slightly in the afternoon sun. Last night was the first night she touched a soul, or a soul touched her. How had that happened? Why had Jacob’s appearance been that at the time of his death? What made him able to touch her? Why was she in his body as he died for a second time? Lucia slowly floated upwards, looking down at Nana Lucia’s gravestone and the flower stems she had broken as she fell against them and the stone. Floating towards the woman to thank her for waking her and wish her well, Lucia began floating towards the nearest bus stop that would take her closer to her home so she could rest in her bed. Lucia, it seemed, was no longer hungry and she resolved to return again, the next day, to replace the flowers.