The sun was blazing hot when Eva arrived in Crocus. It was an ok morning if one could ignore the intense amount of heat. Eva felt sweat running down her back when she placed her bag on a chair in a café she found. Sitting down, she started waved a hand in front of her face with a sigh. “What would you like, miss?” she heard the soft sound of a waitress from behind. Turning to face the girl with a beautiful smile, Eva ordered some chilly orange juice before taking out a piece of paper from the back pocket of her jeans. She had grabbed the paper off the request board without thinking after seeing the high rewards. In fact, she hadn’t even read what it was about yet.

Her eyes skimmed through the details and clicked her tongue in irritation. She had actually signed up for a troublesome thing without thinking. It wasn’t as if Eva was scared of rats or even oversized ones but having to find it in this heat and even kill it made her just want to curl up somewhere and sleep. The request had come from someone named Luciel. But where did she have to go to meet this girl? “Here’s your order,” the waitress placed a glass of orange juice in front of her, smiled, and turned to leave when Eva stopped her. “Hey, do you know someone named Luciel?” she asked, turning the piece of paper in her direction.

The girl looked confused first but a look of recognition soon replaced it when she took a look at the request paper. “Oh yes, that’s Merlin’s assistant,” she answered but smiled sheepishly when Eva gave her a questioning look. “Of course, you wouldn’t know Merlin. Well, if you go to the park just a few minutes of walk from here, Luciel will most likely be there. No one knows what those two do. Merlin’s a big help for us but Luciel is still learning. It’s kind of difficult to understand her. She is always so quiet,” the short haired waitress told Eva who just nodded. Pointing to the direction the girl had earlier looked at, Eva asked, “Is that the way to the park?” “Oh Yes, just go straight and take a left. You’ll get there in two or three minutes,” she answered.

Eva thanked her, paid with a little extra tip for the helpful waitress and grabbed her bag before walking down the path she thought would lead her to the park. But as expected, she arrived in two minutes. The park wasn’t crowded but she spotted a strange girl with light blonde hair and a strange white top hat. She was crouching down in front of a tree, pushing her face close to a rabbit hole as if to inspect something. Eva was only following her gut instinct when she approached the girl with the same piece of paper in her hand. “Are you Luciel? If you aren’t, do you know her?”

501/2000

Eva was right after all. The girl she had approached was Luciel whom, much like what the waitress said, didn’t talk much. From the beginning of their conversation till now, despite how many times Eva beamed or smiled or chuckled or laughed, the girl gave her a blank look and just answered all the relevant questions while ignoring the others. Eva was a bit irritated at the girl. It was the first time in a very long time that Eva had to try this hard to get a positive reaction from someone. Not only did Luciel look extremely bored to be in Eva’s company, she even had the guts to yawn in front of her in the middle of their exchange.

It was kind of amazing and envious how some people could just be true to themselves and not hide behind pretty layer of masks like Eva did. People like that always seemed to be moving forward while Eva was kept glued to the past, stuck and chained without any way to be set free. While she knew it was up to her, Eva was scared of having to let everything she built go. She didn’t want to seem like the vulnerable little girl in front of anyone although that was exactly what she was. So occasionally, whenever she met people like Luciel that was so comfortable with their real self, Eva felt uneasy and unreasonably angry.

“So, how did this happen?” she finally asked, coming around to the real point of their conversation. Luciel looked up with her expressionless blue eyes. “An accident,” she spoke softly. “It was an experiment gone wrong,” she admitted with no shame or guilt. “You should find and kill it. Then come meet me,” was the final things she said before crouching down on the same spot Eva had found her on, doing exactly what she was doing before Eva arrived and disturbed her. “What are you doing?” she couldn’t help ask. “Looking for a rabbit with a pocket watch,” she replied as if she was doing the most obvious thing in the world. This girl had a talent for making others feel like the fool, Eva thought with a sigh.

She didn’t waste any time sticking next to her or in the park after that. She was supposed to find a meter big rat that Luciel had ‘accidentally’ dropped something on. Eva wasn’t even going to ask what that something was but where would she go if she was a rat? Eva didn’t want to imagine that either. In the end, she simply walked around the streets, asking people if they had seen a giant rat run past here. Most of the people gave her a weird look as if she was crazy while some others had their thinking face on. A few of them did point to directions that they thought they saw the rat run to. Eva followed their direction, sighing heavily when the sun seemed to shine even brighter. This was going to be a long day.

1009/2000

“A giant rat?” the woman looked puzzled for a moment. “Oh,” she suddenly exclaimed. “I think I saw one going into that abandoned house at the west side of this city. No one goes there these days. It’s a rather spooky place,” she informed Eva who looked like she had finally seen the light. Eva thanked the woman after walking up to the west side of the city. When she spotted an old man in a rundown old shop, Eva stopped to ask again.

“Sir, have you seen a rather big rat go this way?” Eva tried to imitate the beast’s size with her hands but gave up halfway when she realized what she was doing. The man gave her a blank look with narrowed eyes. “What was that?” he stepped closer to Eva and she ‘Oh’ed in recognition. “Have you seen a big rat?!” she said it a bit louder this time. “Oh yes, it went that way,” he pointed towards a forest like area. “If you walk down that path, you’ll come across an old house. I saw it going in there in the yesterday evening,” he informed. “Thanks,” Eva replied.

The house was in the middle of a forest. Eva had to walk for a good fifteen minutes before she even saw the moss covered roof of it. The building was very old and run down. What she guessed used to be one of the most beautiful houses in the city was now falling apart. Paint was peeling off the walls, the window glasses were all broken and there was dark dust and burnt marks all around, indicating that the house had gone up in fire at some point.

She entered with caution, pushing back the broken door that made a loud screech and almost fell off its hinges. Inside was a red couch completely town apart and dust covered. Little springs stuck out of it and beside it was a wooden table with one of its legs broken. Along the walls were burnt and broken pictures of a family and their dog. If Eva had been searching for a perfect setting for some gothic photoshoots, she decided that it would have been the best place. Sadly, she wasn’t here to ogle at the beauty of the destroyed house but to look for an overgrown rat that must have been hiding there somewhere.

She proceeded further into the house and ended up in a room that seemed like the kitchen. She saw the biggest burnt mark on a wall there which told her that the fire had started there before it spread across the whole house. She looked around until something caught her legs. She looked down to find the remains of a broken plate and bent to pick it up when out the corner of her eyes, she saw something dusty and brown move. Ah, so it had been here all along. Eva turned, coming face to face with the mutated rat. It growled at her and Eva immediately stood up.
1510/2000

The rat lunged at her with its claws slashing at her. Under the dim light coming from the kitchen window, Eva barely made out its profile as she dodged to the left. But it was too late when she noticed from the corner of her eyes the tail that came swishing at her. It hit her on her stomach and Eva was thrown back into a wall with a painful gasp.

Dammit. She felt intense pain shooting up from her stomach. But when the rat came for her again, Eva quickly cast a spell to create a sharp stream of wind to cut and send it back a few meters. It made a painful squeak but was back on its feet again. In the end, Eva had to use the winds to disguise herself and her footsteps. She was pretty sure that the rat was determining where she was with each sound she made.

Eva quickly got behind it with a kitchen knife she had found lying around. It was a little rusty but she guessed that it would do when she stabbed the back of the rat with it. The rat squealed and threw Eva off, swishing at her with its tail again. But Eva managed to avoid it this time although moving was a little painful with the wound over her stomach. It swayed angrily and tried to claw at Eva with whatever energy it had left. Then, she saw it sprinting around in pain for a while until its movements slowed down and it started limping until it fell down on the couch in the living room causing what remained of the couch to collapse and break. Eva had to resist the urge to throw up when she dragged it out from there afterwards to dig a large hole.

She remembered Luciel telling her specifically to bury it since the potions that fell on it could affect other things that might eat its carcass. The last thing Eva needed was some overgrown insects or ants running around the town next. So that’s what Eva, a model and dancer, spent her evening doing, digging a grave for an overgrown rat. By the time she was done burying the thing, the sun was already starting to set, drowning the sky in a golden hue. She went back to the city, avoiding many gazes, looking like she had been run over by something. Back at the park, she found Luciel again who asked her for all the details. She specifically asked her if she buried the rat and Eva narrated the entire story until Luciel gave her a satisfied nod. She gave her the rewards for the job but not before looking at Eva’s wounds and telling her to take care of it. Eva nodded, taking her reward and leaving the girl to do whatever it was that she was doing. Maybe Luciel found a rabbit with a pocket watch and had an adventure of her own?

2010/2000