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When the Heir of Famine woke up, she would find the others gone, missing, disappeared. Perhaps they had escaped without her, this wouldn't be the first time this happened, she was the slightly special 'sibling' after all. Only occasionally.

There was a door this time - though it could have easily been a figment of her imagination - and what seemed like a long black window that reflected only her own visage. How nice of them to put a mirror against this room: it was unfortunate it wasn't breakable.

Lastly in the center of the room a table, and then a chair. When she attempted to move past the table she would notice something rather odd: her legs seemed to be connected some sort of long winding metal rope. It kind of hurt as it rubbed against her flesh, a strange electric jolt - just a tingle really - running along the shackles every time she tried to move further than the length of the rope.

And the walls, they were white, so white, blinding. Poor Cymbeline was all cooped up with nowhere to play.

It was that exact moment in time, Cymbeline perched on her 'throne' on top of the table, that Caelius walked in, the door open behind him, as if expecting other visitors as well. He put his cell phone away, took one look at the Heir of Famine, and walked back towards the door and out.

Thankfully he came back a few seconds later with another chair, pulling it close enough to the Heir, though she might have gotten some sort of joy knowing that she was indeed looking down at him: a pity about his oddly cropped hair though, it was even weirder from the top angles.

"I appreciate your cooperation," the Death Hunter began rather levelly. "Apologies for the wait, the maintenance team has not quite yet arrived. In the meanwhile," he pulled out two photos, one of a strange place, covered in sand, the second of an equally bizarre cavern buried in the sand with strange bits and pieces of flesh sticking out from it, and and placed them on the table. Whether or not she could see them from that angle was probably another story. "I see your elder has been busy."

Again, not a question, a simple comment.

Gale had been doing nothing in particular when he received Caelius' text. Sitting in his room at the bare desk, rubbing his fingers against his temple to try and push away the beginnings of a headache. He almost didn't hear the tinny buzzing noise coming from his hip.

<< Do I need to tell you every time your phone rings? >>

"Maybe," said Gale indifferently, but he pulled the phone out, glancing at the screen.

"...maintenance duty?" he read aloud, brow furrowing in slight confusion. He did not know where that had come from, or what exactly it entailed, but it did not do well to disregard Caelius or even question what he was doing.

Pulling his coat from the back of the chair, Gale swung it over his shoulders, pushing his arms through the sleeves. It still felt a little stiff, but he made his way from the room, pulling his hair back away from his face as he walked.

The room that he had been directed to was not the normal classroom. In fact, it seemed quite distanced from the rest, set quietly aside - though for what, exactly?

He almost walked right past the door, but heard Caelius' voice, and turned to his right, quietly entering the room -

- and very nearly stopped, once he saw who was sitting on top of the table. Fortunately, however, Gale did not miss a step, instead moving to stand silently against the far wall to await further instructions. He did not know why he had been called here, but the door was still open, which meant that Caelius had summoned more.

Horseman.

<< Or horsewoman, in this case. >>

She was perched atop her chair, poised on the table, as though it were a kingdom and she were the king - or queen, rather, and her expression was not the same serious, angry ones as her brother and sisters. Hers was amused, delight, even, her eyes not quite filled with sanity.

Gale's eyes narrowed just the slightest, but he did not move from where he stood.

It had been luck that Candace had been between songs when her phone went off and got her attention, stopping her from completing the back handspring she had been attempting to reteach herself. Sighing, she picked up and read what was happening this time. Another mission? No...ugh it was the maintenance duty Caelius had mentioned to them. Fine, fine. She'd changed into proper clothing she could wear out of her own room, grabbing Atropos' rings on her way out the door.

When she arrived she was surprised to see Madison and Gale, pulling her gloves and rings on as she have them each a small wave. "Yo. Maintenance duty?" She asked them before noticing just what was in the room with them. She was sittin on a chair on top of the table...and she had no abdomen. No real abdomen to speak of, anyway. Candace frowned and regarded the horsewoman curiously. This looked like an insane asylum combined with an interrogation room. She gave Caelius a nod. "Hello, sir..."

It almos disappointed her his couldn't be the horsewoman in red. She would have loved to see Death Pony again. No really! She wanted to punch her in the face is all!

Candace glanced back toward Jordan as he stepped into the room, giving him a small wave. "Yo. Did you bring a sandwich?" She teased quietly, jerking her head in the stomachless horsewoman's direction. Clearly she needed to eat more~.

He watched the trainees - maintenance duty - file in from the corner of his eye, attention focused on the Heir. Out of all the four, the Famine Heir had always been the easiest and hardest to deal with. With a great amount of self-restraint, he pulled out a pair of gloves - surgical ones - took the two photos, and handed them over to the creature being questioned.

Caelius let the heir examine the photos. "Trainees, your duty here is to remain here on guard duty, entertain our little guest, and take notes, with whatever observation skills you may have, if any, for your next mission."

Several minutes passed as they waited for Cymbeline to actually say or do anything. Finally the Death Hunter sat back down on his chair. "If you are done reminiscing, before I go visit your 'sibling' I have a question. Namely, the location of a certain map that one of you stole from us your last visit here." Though his tone was level, the the amount of derision slathered into each word was enough to suggest that he did not expect anything intelligible from their current specimen at all.

Gale nodded to each of the other trainees as they stepped inside - Madison was first, hesitantly making her way to stand beside him, her eyes on the horsewoman - followed closely by Candace (Gale severely hoped she would not call him chipmunk again...), Jordan, and eventually Marcus.

Gale's eyes cut towards Caelius as he spoke again, lips pressing together in a thin line.

Next mission. Always so vague, our leader.

Jinhai made a noise of consent. << He's not one to mince words, is he? I suggest you pay very close attention. >>

Actually I was going to sit here and contemplate my surroundings, thought Gale sarcastically, but he knew the rifle was right anyway.

"...the location of a certain map..."

Gale's brows drew closer together. A map?

...a map to what, exactly..?

Ennéa slipped into the room and did a double take at the figure seated high up upon the table. That was a random place to sit. No one else seemed to be paying the odd seating arrangement any mind though so Ennéa mentally shrugged and went to stand over by Jordan.

She tried not to stare in morbid fascination at the horseman's exposed ribs and bony torso as Caelius gave his instructions. So this was the maintenance duty the senior hunter had mentioned at the end of their last mission. For some reason Ennéa thought it would be more mundane, like sweeping the grounds or changing light bulbs.

Not that she particularly minded doing something more interesting than cleaning, but Ennéa couldn't help but feel a little uneasy. One of those horsemen had nearly killed Jordan and Maddie and another deathpony had nearly wiped them all out during the candidate test.

And Ennéa had seen the situational crime dramas on tv, she knew how it usually went: a seemingly captured madman (mad horseman?) taunts the interrogators then suddenly breaks free of their restraints and goes on a murderous rampage, killing all the cops in the interrogation room -- only in this case it would be trainee hunters.

Pfft, bring it. Baraz's wings rustled and Ennéa got the sense that he was sizing the horseman up. With this many hunters in the room we'd drop that pony before it could even draw blood. He said cockily.

Ennéa sighed softly to herself and then straightened to better watch the horseman. She didn't think it would be that easy but she hoped it wouldn't even come to that. Just observe for now. She could do that.