What in the world is going on? Part 2

Paschalis de Santis (with Wong Ha Jung)

Calmly, Paschalis waited for the girl to finish up with her ranting before he spoke. The gist of it was strangely similar to how students in his powers classes usually acted. All confusion, angry, and self righteousness. Too much certainty in themselves. Once again, he wondered why the Merrow Clan had seemingly decided to suddenly stop informing their children about magic. Even something as short as Oh, and remember that sometimes strange things may happen would have been nice. The lunatic Merrow hadn't actually offered a real explanation for it and it was truly a work of pure idiocy. Just because the Merrow had forgotten their magic didn't mean that the rest of Europe hadn't.

"Miss, there were a number of issues that had to be addressed. Whether or not you are a danger was only one of them. Even though that has recently been resolved" -in a way that was still not totally in her favor- "the main issue now is the fact that you are currently trespassing in a high security government facility." Which wasn't a total lie. Manta Carlos, for all of its supernatural freak accidents, was still probably secure enough to count as one of the safest places in the known universe. Multiverse. Whichever. And it really was government funded, too. By the Americans, by the Mexicans, by the Chinese, the Japanese, and so on.

"As this is an island, I imagine that you would have a difficult time getting off on your own. Between here and the continents, any traffic is usually one way only," Paschalis explained. "This island is responsible for the invention and testing of technology that nobody wants the public to get a hold of. Those crystals you've been seeing as well as the liquid in that jar are the result of our technology reacting with your particular biochemistry, which is quite a problem because for all intents and purposes, that technology was completely benign up until this point." This wonderful technology, by the way, was called air. And Paschalis couldn't say with complete certainty that he didn't think somebody on the island could have created it because he knew damn well that they did had elementals, demigods, and actual gods on the island.

"The point is, you are in a rather unique position, Miss Merrow. Not only are you a security risk, but your very presence has become a real variable in some of our experiments. In addition, you may not be aware of this yet, but you have already been on the island for approximately three weeks. We have no idea how you've even manage to make it here, and I would suppose that you don't as well, unless you'd like to challenge that stance."

Wong Ha Jung (with Paschalis de Santis)

Flinching a little at the cold sounding laughter but otherwise feeling that the danger had passed, Wong Ha Jung tugged at the doctor's sleeve gently to get him out of the way. "It might take a while for us to get this all sorted out," the man said timidly. "In the mean time, we can set you up somewhere. It's not all concrete and steel here. This island is more or less set up as a typical city on the outside so even if you're put on house arrest, it hopefully won't be too bad. We don't normally put people into prison unless they've done something really horrible."

His voice trailed off, however, as he tried to think of just where she would end up. It was almost unheard of for people with utterly no knowledge of magic to just stumble upon the island by accident. Sure, it did happen from time to time but the average time between each occurrence was almost decades. Maybe in the early years, it was easier to find stragglers coming in but nowadays, security was much tighter.

Above him, there was a quiet sound as Paschalis sighed. "I know somebody who would be willing to volunteer," he said. If his tone weren't so apathetic sounding, Wong Ha Jung might have said that it was resigned. "There's certain lawyer on the island named Niccolò Belmonte. He's got more than enough space for another person and knowing him, he would most likely jump at the opportunity to help somebody else out. He's fond of drinking but I don't actually think that I've ever seen him out of his mind."

Belmonte? Now that was a familiar name. "I think I know him," Wong Ha Jung affirmed slowly. The counselor thought that he had met the man on one of those occasions when he felt the urge to get stupidly drunk without arranging for a way to get back to the apartment. "He's a good man."

"Um, if that's okay with you," he said to Lorelei, with an uncertain smile. "It's all we have at the moment but I suppose we could always run through a few more people. No matter where you end up, though, I suppose that I'll have to drop by regularly."

Which, on second thought. Oh dear, this might not be good. Though the Academy had hired a few more counselors to help deal with issues, it still seemed like his work load had remained at the same level. He wasn't sure who he'd put things off on if he were to add something else to his schedule. It didn't help either that he wasn't exactly having a great time with movement these days.

Just deal with it, I guess...

And with this, the thread (probably) ends.

Wong Ha Jung (with Paschalis de Santis)

"Oh, good." He couldn't quite keep the relief out of his voice. If Niccolò Belmonte hadn't been suggested, then he wouldn't have been sure who else to ask. Kitasaki, maybe, but he was a teacher who had classes to attend to almost daily. "I'll go and take care of the paperwork, then." At the decision, Paschalis merely nodded and turned to leave. A view through the open door revealed guards still standing casually in the hallway.

Wong Ha Jung moved to follow but stopped after a moment, thinking of the danger that Lorelei was still in. He added, "I think I can probably make your records inaccessible to everybody but those who really need to know." All he had to do was list her as a potential student and that would turn her over to the Academy. Mostly. It wasn't like this was the first time a student had been on the wrong side of the law. That was more or less one in every four. The oddity came from the fact that she had been on the wrong side of Manta Carlos law. Hopefully, things would still go through. And if not, there was always Niccolò.

He surveyed the room quickly one last time before he left, in case he had forgotten anything important. Like the young man who had been there before his arrival. It seemed like he had snuck out at some point in all of the chaos. Wong Ha Jung hoped that he wouldn't say anything about what had transpired there.

Well, let's see what happens.