Aroma Finds a Clue

Chapter 1

Aroma awoke the next morning to her smart light's dim glow. After turning on her bedside lamp to see, she glanced around the room, noting the lack of other people or chairs for them to sit on. She tilted her head slightly and wondered how those ancestral drummers managed to sit around her bed last night, then turned off her alarm before it went off and got up.

She grabbed her robe from the bathroom as she passed through the hallway. She went downstairs to the kitchen and peered out the dining room's large patio glass doors into the back yard for a long moment, an eyebrow twitching and lips tightening slightly. The grass was green, lake pool water sparkling in the dawn light, trees shadowed in the distance. No sign remained of the snowglobe frozen terrarium with suspended lion ornaments.

She popped leftover pizza in the microwave, then grabbed a protein shake and large spiral-bound hard-leather binder with tabs on its pages. She placed them on the table beside her recliner in the living room. By the time she returned to the kitchen the pizza was done reheating. She carried it out, sat down, and began to eat in silence.

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Chapter 2

When she was done eating, she chugged the protein shake with several large gulps then opened the binder to the first tab. She flipped to each tab to check for date specific activities and found none that were scheduled for today, so she went back to the first tab and read through it.

#

Paid Task

Contracted By: Euclidean Dunes Hospital

Beneficiary: Patient Emory Jones (photo attached)

Job Description: Create an avatar for patient that patient can fully access while comatose.

Details: Game is MagiTech Mysteries Live. It is an online dynamically generated game world on SteamVR. Backstory involves artifacts of ancient civilizations being investigated by a modern era Earth for possible technological classification. Current status of in-game world: sports include use of telekinesis and elemental manipulation magic, rumors are circulating that the artifacts relied on an extinct atmospheric composition, some conspiracy theories speculate atmospheric copper gas. Investigating these issues further through archeology and various forms of research is the premise of MagiTech Mysteries Live.

Note: Avatar creation mostly complete. Hair color selection imminent.

Upon completion, send invoice to the email used for correspondences: [email protected]

#

After studying the entry, she closed the binder and moved to her home office. She powered on the pc and opened SteamVR to the game she was working in. After it loaded, she navigated to the character sheet save file and looked over the completed parts. Physical condition stats, good. Mental and reasoning stats, very good, borderline excellent. Social stats, fair. Family, none. Friends, none. Background, to be determined. Appearance, unfinished.

She minimized the game and opened her email. There, a new notification was waiting. It appeared to be a reply to a request from her for preferences. Basically, the patient didn't care about family/friends, just wanted her to pick someone at random, but no more than 3 relationship connections. Prefered a generous background but nothing overt - maybe a high middle class or low upper class upbringing and public school plus a prestigious academy.

She returned to the game and selected [family]. The next screen gave several family dynamic options. She picked orphan, large inheritance, raised by family butler. Heir to a fallen noble house, name unknown to society but still well-to-do. Younger sister in middle school.

She selected [Friends] next and selected a pair. Marcus and Emily, siblings (twins). They and the mc grew up together. Inseparable. Roughly equivalent to each other stat-wise but opposite personalities. Marcus was reserved but mischievous, Emily was extroverted but serious.

Then she moved on to the last bit and spent a few hours painstakingly coloring every individual strand of the avatar's hair the right combination of blonds to achieve the look the patient had requested.

It was well past lunch when she hit [done] and sent the final product to Euclidean Dunes for finalization, attached to an invoice and a note requesting confirmation that patient intended to play the game directly.

She leaned back in her chair, stretched her arms above her head, then got up to go fix lunch. She had some leftover steak and salad fixings, so she made her usual salad with the fajita steak mixed in. This time, she used some Quiznos-branded balsamic vinegairette instead of Taco Bell fire sauce.

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Chapter 3

After she finished eating lunch she checked her email again. There were two new notifications. The first one read:

#

Aroma, we are sorry to inform you that, earlier today, your grandparents were in an accident and passed away.

#

The second one read:

#

Aroma, we are sorry to inform you that, earlier today, after receiving the information that her parents had just passed, your mother fainted from shock and was rushed to the hospital. She didn't make it.

#

Aroma stared blankly at the screen for a moment. She didn't remember those people. But even so, her lips trembled, her throat tightened, and a single tear slid down her cheek. Not for the people she didn't remember, but for the memories she'd never be able to create.

She took a deep breath, then turned off her computer. She just sat there for a while, not seeing anything. Then she returned to her binder, flipped to the last page, stuck a tab on top, and wrote:

#

Mother and grandparents died. Write speech in case I'm invited to the funeral. Use the idea "people can learn anything if they live long enough, including emotional control" as prompt. Date TBD.

#

She then flipped back in her binder to an earlier entry that still had a tab.

#

Merit Academy is having a haunted minecraft exhibit and challenged me to find the hosts. I am to follow a specific set of instructions:

"Enter the haunted house by the front door and immediately turn right. Follow the hall halfway past the first door then turn around ang go back the way you came. Enter the second door on the right and follow the hall to the end."

A professor Nicholas is rumored to be able to read memories. He is fond of pranks.

#

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She grabbed her clothes and put them on, followed by her shoes. She grabbed a packet of pain pills and stuffed them into her mouth, gulped them down with a few chugs of water, and grabbed her keys. She then left and locked her door.

She walked to the nearest bus station a mile and a half from her home and sat on the bench to wait. She didn't have to wait long before the next bus arrived.

The driver watched her climb the stairs. "You ha' a pass?" She shook her head. He opened a booklet. "Where ya headed, then?"

"Which stop is Merit Academy?"

He slid his thumb down the list and located it. "That's Merit stop, miss. It's third from here an'll be 30 pence." He held out his hand expectantly. She handed over three dimes and then found a seat.

It took twenty minutes to reach her stop. She stood up and stopped at the door, turning to face the driver. "When does the last bus back to my stop leave this station?"

The driver paused, then asked, "Ya stop? What'un was that?"

She blinked, then reworded her question for maximum clarity. "At what time does the last bus of the day that returns to where I boarded from leave this station?"

The bus driver stared at her for a beat. "10pm. Just say that next time." Then he squinted at her suspiciously. "But you want to leave afore that, ya hear? Is safer to be home before dark." She gave him a long look, her eyes narrowing ever so slightly, nodded, then disembarked.

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Chapter 4

The Academy looked like a prison yard from the outside with high walls covered in barbed wire. But the gates were wide open so she walked right in.

She was in a large courtyard and could see many buildings. One of them looked like a cross between a haunted mansion, the kind students worked on for a festival in anime, and a minecraft witch's hut. That had to be the place.

Inside it was dark. The entrance was one door among many that lined the hallway at regular intervals. She looked down the hall to the left for a long moment curiously before turning right. She walked past one door, counting her steps to measure distance. One. Two. Three. Four. Five... On the sixth step she reached the center point of the first door. So she took three more steps continuing in the same direction. One. Two. Three. And stopped. She stared down the hallway in front of her, wanting to know what was down there, before turning back the way she came. She passed the door that had appeared at her sixth step earlier, then entered the next door that appeared on her right.

The new hallway was identical to the last, except it entirely lacked doors. She started walking, and continued counting her steps from habit. One. Two. Three. One hundred and one. One hundred and two. Three hundred and three. And still no end in sight.

She kept walking. When she reached six hundred and six, the air rippled and she found she was at the end of the hall. In front of her stood two youths. Looking at them made her eyes open a little wider, her spine stand a little straighter, the corners of her mouth twitch upward sightly, and her balance shift forward. She forced herself to relax.

They looked alike. Pale ivory skin, black hair that looked naturally slicked back, a pair of dainty horns at the hairline that appeared to shimmer and ears that were slightly pointed. They wore a cross between a traditional butler outfit and a modern school uniform with black slacks, polished black dress shoes that were somehow shaped like hiking boots, a black collared jacket with twin tails in back, and differently colored shirts underneath. One had a blue shirt and red eyes, the other had a purple shirt and black eyes. Their fingers ended in claws that matched the color of their eyes. Were they demons? The black eyed twin held a tablet.

Mr. Black looked down at the tablet in his hand for a moment as if reviewing something. Then he said without looking up, sounding indifferent, "Aroma. Plebeian. Answered our summons. Did not follow protocol." Then he looked up at her and stated simply, "Leave." His brother looked at him, one eyebrow raised and a slight smirk on his lips, but said nothing.

Her temperature rose slightly as she felt a subtle affront. Did she not do exactly what the challenge said she was supposed to? "Uh, what? Did I hear you correctly? You said I did not follow protocol? Does that mean you believe I did not follow the instructions I was given?" He ignored her. She found her jaw clenching slightly and took a breath, fighting both irritation and the urge to just stare. "I received a challenge and followed it through exactly. If I broke protocol, then the fault lies with whoever sent the invitation, not with me."

He snorted. "Prove it." She took out her phone, navigated to the screenshot of the invitation, and turned the device around so he could see it. He snatched it out of her hand and read through it while occasionally referring back to his tablet, then reluctantly handed it back to her and nodded.

Mr. Red had been watching this interaction with a gleam in his eye. He never lost his smirk. "Show me your arm." She held up her arm for him and he stepped toward her, closer than strictly necessary. She could feel the intense heat radiating from him. It was obvious his body temperature was significantly higher than an ordinary human. Then he grabbed her wrist and her breath hitched as his skin scalded hers. Distracted by the unexpected pain, she didn't see the syringe until he had released her. When she looked down at it, her skin was red from the heat and there was a new mole on her arm. She rubbed her scalded skin and it felt hot to the touch, causing her to subtly wince.

Then he clicked a button on his remote and the ceiling retracted. He leaned in close to her ear as if relaying a secret. "I hope you can fly. Because that," he pointed at the sky, "is the only way out. We're stuck here since we lost our wings." Then he stepped back to stand by his brother, grinning wickedly. He was so beautiful in that moment that Aroma forgot to breathe.

Mr. Black glanced suspiciously at his brother and sighed in resignation at his antics. Then his voice boomed out, dripping with arcane power, "Fly!"

The new mole suddenly blazed with pain and Aroma felt weightless. She could feel the air moving past her, and before she could orient herself or understand what was happening she once again stood in the courtyard. The difference this time was that the entire compound was now surrounded by a dense wall of fog.

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Chapter 5

After a moment, she looked around and located the building where professor Nicholas held his lectures. She was almost at the door when the world disappeared.

When she could see again the door was no longer in front of her. In fact, she was no longer in the courtyard. There was a wall of impenetrable fog ahead of her.

She looked around. She was standing on the sidewalk. Someone was holding her. She turned to look, and saw a young man wearing a Merit Academy student badge. When he saw she had focused on him, he slowly released her. Then he opened his mouth.

"I'm sorry for spiriting you away. I'm Rob. Rob Smith. I'm a new student at Merit Academy. I was supposed to receive my student equipment today, but I was running a bit late and when I got here this fog appeared and blocked the way. I couldn't get through it. But you're inside already. Could you contact the admin staff and bring out my new equipment? I'd be grateful." He said all of that quite rapidly, not even stopping to breathe, then panted briefly.

She blinked a couple times and waited for his breathing to stabilize. "I'm not a student. Ask them yourself." That's what phones are for? Then she turned around and walked through the fog until she was back in the courtyard again. Wait... If he could teleport her out, why not just teleport in? If she could just walk in, why couldn't he? And why did he never think to use a phone? He should've been on time, anyway...

Shaking her head at the stupidity, she finally made it inside the professor's lecture hall.

She waited by the door, scanning the room. When the professor noticed her he walked over. "Is there something you need?"

She said just one word, "Memory."

A dangerous light lit in the professor's eyes for but an instant before he turned to the students. "I'm stepping away for a bit. Read page 3 in your textbooks." Then he grabbed her arm and tugged her into the room, shutting the door behind her.

He turned and waked toward a door on the opposite side of the lecture hall. She followed. Once inside, she found herself alone in his office with him.

His eyes immediately began glowing bright red. He was emanating an oppressively menacing aura, causing Aroma to swallow and instinctively take a step back. "How exactly do you know about that?" He growled.

She took out her phone and showed him the website that vaguely said there was a rumor. He stared at it intently for a moment then sighed, his eyes returning to normal, and palmed his face. It was as if he was embarrassed about losing his composure and unnecessarily revealing the fact that he was a vampire. Then he relaxed his stance, crossed his arms, and grinned, prominently showing his fangs. "So you came here to feed me?"

She shrugged and replied, "If that is what it takes for you to help me."

His smile froze, then faded. "You're no fun." Her lip twitched slightly, as if she was about to smile. His eyes lingered on her lips a second, his own curling upward slightly. He clearly noticed her mirth. Then he moved to sit behind his desk, gesturing at the other chair. "So tell me what's going on. Why do you need my help?"

She explained her situation. He was quiet for a long time, eyes unfocused, deep in thought. Eventually he stood up and walked around the desk to stand next to her. He gently grabbed her hand and lifted her wrist to his lips. Then he stared at her. Maybe he was waiting for her permission. Or maybe he just wanted to see her reaction.

When she nodded, he opened his mouth and bit down hard, not holding back at all. Aroma winced. She could feel electricity traveling through her body from her wrist. It wasn't unpleasant. She gripped the arm of the chair hard with her other hand, body trembling. She closed her eyes, lost in the growing feeling of euphoria.

She had started feeling a bit woozy from blood loss and briefly wondered if he ever planned to release her. Not a beat later, he let go of her wrist with exaggerated reluctance and clicked it, then wiped his mouth. He looked up to meet her gaze. Then shook his head while licking his hand clean of her blood with the slow, languorous motion of a cat. "I'm sorry. Whatever power is blocking your autobiographical recall is beyond my ability to bypass or destroy. Trying could leave you a vegetable." He paused and put his hand on his chin, as if thinking. He almost seemed to be contemplating something. Then he said, absentmindedly, "Turning you would probably nullify it though." His gaze sharpened as he put his hand down and stared directly at her, as if examining her soul. "Would you like to try?"

Aroma hesitated before shaking her head. He pouted, "Shame. Well, come visit me anytime." He grinned. "Thank you for the meal. Would love to have you again." She shivered.

She left the lecture hall. As she was crossing the courtyard to leave academy grounds, the student that had pulled her out before was hurrying toward her. She stopped him by stepping in his path and holding up a hand. "It's good you were able to get past that fog."

He stared at her blankly. "Fog? What fog?" He frowned in confusion. Then he yelped. "Sorry! I'm late, I have to go!" He hurried past her into the school building.

She stared after him, brows slightly furrowed, then looked around. Indeed, the fog was gone.

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Chapter 6

She took the bus home and opened the binder to the page with the professor, adding a few words. She wrote with more pressure on her pen than usual, her hand trembling slightly, causing the paper to crease.

#

Professor suggested turning me into a vampire could solve the memory problem. I declined. For now.

#

Then she opened a package of red tabs and stuck one on the page so it barely showed, then closed the binder. Afterward, she made spaghetti with jalapeños and grated parmasan cheese for dinner, then got ready for bed. She meditated on the day's events while waiting for sleep. She was especially focused on the accusation that she didn't follow protocol and the disappointing failure to reclaim her lost memories. It didn't take long for sleep to claim her.

End of volume 2.