Justified Xenophobia 「Invite / Athanasios 」

“...It never ends, does it?”

Grumbling to himself, the beleaguered diplomat sorts between a huge mess of paperwork. One pile was research sent for him to read and become knowledgable out for his meeting with the Russian goverrnment, some were the required paperwork to file in order to arrange a potential meeting with the United Kingdom, and a requisition form asking him to supply confirmation paperwork to the higher-ups...not to mention the fact that he had to go back and properly file his own entrance paperwork! He was scouted for this, and yet he still had to do something so basic? It was grating, but nothing that he wasn’t used to.

Just a few years ago, he wouldn’t have batted an eye at it. But now, it was just so -mundane-

He was getting sick of paperwork. Pretty soon he’d be in line with the rest of humanity in despising it. It was so much harder to see a perfectly written and executed form as a powerful weapon when he’d seen real, world-altering weapons in action, after all. Still, Atha had a job to do, musings about taking a different path through life came afterwards. It’d certainly be easier to get into the Association with this under his belt...

Deciding to take a break, he makes a round through the hall to the water cooler. As usual, it seems someone else had the same idea, attempting to test his impatience with their mere presence. However, it wasn’t one of the office workers that normally cluttered up the hall...it was a young girl.

“Are you looking for someone, child?” He asks the question just as much to get a look in her thoughts as it was to receive a verbal answer. A direct action usually corresponded to a direct mental response, even if the verbal one that came later was deceptive. Still, he didn’t expect all too much, only to know if she was to be escorted to one of the actual agents’ rooms, or back to the residence hall.

However, the result was not what he expected. Her mind was...loose. Slippery. He couldn’t get a hold on it, but in a way, it felt familiar. He’d reached the thoughts present in a mind like that before, but it’d certainly been a while...it was clear that this person had some rather unique properties. It shouldn’t take too long before he had the hang of things again.

A Mindwalker of the Zacharias family trying to read the thoughts of someone who was not quite human was something akin to attempting to tune an old stereo. The base settings didn’t give a clear picture, and when you tried to attack the information present in the air in another way, it was difficult to find what was the precise way to interpret things. While he could detect a general feeling of apprehension that spiked when she noticed him, he couldn’t get any specifics. However, this mind was similar enough to one that he had already found the “tuning” for, so it took him only a short time to begin piecing the thoughts together.

Why is HE here?! Why -now-?!

“Just loitering, hmm? Well, that’s not good. People work here, you see.” Despite his words, he couldn’t quite believe what he was sensing through his magic. This little girl recognized him, and with enough vehemence to think about him like that? That’s certainly not something he expected. Even if he hadn’t read minds, though, between the sudden shift of expression and the crack in her voice, he could tell that there was something up about this little girl. The niggling sense of familiarity that her mental “voice” seemed to have didn’t help either. In the end, he decides on just trying to get her to think more, to get a feel for what was going on.

“If you don’t have business here, you should probably be off. Still, of all the places to loiter, why the administrative wing? Were you trying to play a prank?” With a chuckle, he gets himself a cup of water. “You might want to think about heading home. This isn’t a place for children.”

Her reaction was powerful, Athanasios allows a smile to form on his face at the sight of her grumbling. Even better, despite it only coming out audibly as a low mumble, it was there. He could use the words that only barely manifest into voice and have it just come off as good hearing.

“You’ve been pranked? Why so? I hope you weren’t made to come here in order to satisfy some silly game.”

Her thoughts were loud and grumbling. If only I could show my ID. I wouldn’t have been treated like a child in any other scenario but this one. Well. That made it rather clear she was more than she seemed to be. Why was she playing along, then? Someone that prideful would honestly have something more to do than simply loiter in order to avoid simply identifying herself as more than a mere child. There were certainly more than enough homunculi or the like that it wouldn’t have been an odd explanation, either.

In the end, Athanasios just shrugs back. “No, you’re not in the way. Still, it’s unfortunately my responsibility to at least send your legal guardian a notification about where you are. Regulations for unattended children under fourteen, I’m afraid.” Looking back at his office, he shakes his head. “It’s a bother, but I’ll do it. If you have an I.D. number, that’d be most convenient, but otherwise I can just look you up by name if that’d be easier.”

Between the general feeling he got from her mind, and her obvious inhuman nature...he could say for sure she was very reminiscent of someone from his past in particular. Could she be a member of her family, perhaps? It certainly wouldn’t be a stretch. “I could also look through personnel files for your guardian. Do your parents work here? Older sibling, perhaps?”

"Sign here, and here." The secretary was as polite as possible, but honestly Anton felt like he was opening a bank account again. He'd done it more than enough times in his youth that he equated paperwork to opening an account. It was all rather monotonous. Thankfully no one was complaining or yelling at him for breaking the Venetia diving suit, well not breaking but rather being lightly damaged. He was lucky to be alive after the suit became compromised during his most recent Ray Shift. Thankfully everyone was rather understanding of the plight he had just survived.

He'd even gotten a good job/nice to see you alive memo from the development team. Still though he had to report his findings, his experience, his thoughts and complaints to the administrative wing. He had literary damaged a priceless 600 year old relic turned one of a kind mystic code.

"Aaand that's it, the board will review your reports in the next meeting, Mr Artzen."

"Uh huh." Anton mumbled, putting the pen back on the table and passing the last of the papers. "Any news on how preparation for my workshop is going along?" He asked, leaning back on the chair. "Gimme a second to check." The secretary began typing on her computer. Anton could tell what the reply would be from her expression. Well it was no big deal, he could still wait. As long as they laid off sending him on more suicidal missions.

"Looks like the request is still pending."

"I see, well thanks for checking."

"I'll ask around, see how its going." The secretary offered him a sympathetic smile. "Thanks, that'd be great." He smiled amiably as well. Anton stood up and left the little dispatch office.

---

As he walked back to his dormitory slash workshop. Anton overheard what sounded like an argument further down the corridor. He was about to round back and go a different way, in hopes of not getting dragged into anything. But then he heard what felt like an oddly familiar voice coming from that area. He couldn't quite place it at first, it sounded oriental and he'd lived in Asia for some time. He had actually spent his childhood moving from country to country, but that voice felt more recognizable than usual, not quite the same but it felt oddly familiar. So out of actual curiosity and because if it was an acquaintance of his mother he was obligated to greet them.

As he got closer he saw it was a man and a small person who were talking. It didn't look like an argument but there was obviously a discussion going on. Anton squinted since his farsight wasn't that good, but he managed to make out the details of the girl. Black hair, piercing red eyes... It was almost the spitting image of someone who was close to his family albeit way younger, way younger.

Kuroishi, Ayame was a good friend of his mother. She was also probably the closest thing to an actual elder sister figure to him. He had Seluna of course, but though she was older than him it usually felt like he was the oldest and more mature of the two. But Ayame was one of the few people that left distinctive memories in Anton's memories of his youth.

So Anton's curiosity was peeked even more. There was also the fact that he was raised in a manner in which he saw friends as family, and their family were his family by extension. That meant that if somehow that kid was related to Ayame, who looked out for him and his sister years ago. Then he was more than willing to get tangled in what anything he'd normally avoid.

He began walking more briskly. The closer he got, the more uncanny resemble he saw between the kid and Ayame. They must be relatives. If he didn't know better he'd mistake it for Ayame's actual child. He also hoped that the kid was at least half as cunning as Ayame. He decided to go for the classical bluff to get someone out of trouble.

"Sorry Kuroishi! I got held up, let's go ok?" He said, as he drew nearer. He gave a polite nod with a polite smile to the blond man, he was probably wondering where the kid's parent was or why there was a kid in Chaldea in the first place. Couldn't blame him, he'd do the same once the coast was clear.

"I'm sorry if she caused trouble. We'll get going now."

Anton's plan failed for two reasons. He didn't know the bridge for his bluff had crashed and burn before he appeared. Also he did not know that he was talking to a telepath. Luckily he had one unaware advantage should his mind get probed. There was clear concern in his mind, confusion as well but well intentioned emotions came from him.