Pride x Familiar (37 page)

The difference between the two kinds of Aventis
is somewhat telling.

A non-Pureblood’s compatibility with their
Symbiote rarely exceeds ninety percent. That means that the
Symbiote is only able to perform its ‘tasks’ of strengthening the
host, healing injuries and keeping them healthy to ninety percent
of its ability. Most non-Purebloods rate a compatibility with their
Symbiote of between seventy and eighty percent. Haruka Amiella was
rated at eighty five percent which put her in good standing against
other non-Purebloods.

In contrast, a Pureblood is a hundred percent
compatible with their Symbiote. They benefit the most from what the
Symbiote can do for them.

Simone Alucard and Prissila Ventiss were
fortunate enough to be born Purebloods. Their mothers were also
Purebloods, and it was likely that Simone and Prissila would give
birth to Pureblood offspring.

But it wasn’t assured to be the case.

A case in point is Maya Khayman.

Maya’s mother, Cassandra Khayman Sora, is a
Pureblood.

The Khaymans have multiple business interests in
the entertainment and residential industries, so it’s safe to say
that Maya was born into a very, very wealthy family. However, she
was born without the Symbiote, relegating her to the ranks of a
Regular. While this was disappointing to the rather proud Khayman
family, and the Sora Pride, all hope was not lost because it was
almost
assured that Maya would develop a compatibility with
the Sora strain of the Symbiote when she entered her teenage
years.

She did not, and instead awakened to an
existence as a Familiar on the month she turned sweet sixteen.

Needless to say, this was something of a shock
to the Khaymans.

Needless to say, this sent the girl into
suicidal despair.

The Khaymans had never birthed a Familiar in all
the generations since becoming Aventis, and her family didn’t know
how to deal with this outcome. It can be said that the general
ambience was one of disappointment. Some expressed shame toward
Cassandra, as though she had dishonored the Pride by giving birth
to a Familiar.

And that shame swallowed and consumed Maya.

Perhaps if she’d been an only child, she might
have struggled through her despair. But Maya’s younger sister,
Katalina was a Pureblood.

It didn’t help having a sister that looked upon
her with disdain.

It didn’t help having a sister that belittled
her at every opportunity.

So, in the time honored tradition, she attempted
to commit suicide by slitting her wrists. An Aventis might heal
quickly enough, but not a Familiar. As misfortune would have it, it
was Katalina who found her older sister bleeding to death in the
bathroom. And it was Katalina who saved her life by giving Maya her
blood. The Symbiote healed Maya’s body, but not her heart.

This was all kept a closely guarded family
secret, but there were those that learnt of it nonetheless. In
fact, it was the Countess that told me about Maya. She also told me
that Katalina Khayman Sora was a senior in middle school at Galatea
Academy.

Needless to say, that girl didn’t take it well
to learn her elder sister was now attending her school, even though
they were in separate years.

I thought the girl was being stupid. She still
had a sister, one whose life she’d saved, whereas I didn’t – or
thought I didn’t.

Even if Maya was a Familiar, she was still
family to Katalina.

I was fairly certain that one day Katalina would
come to regret treating Maya the way she did.

(Haruka)

School Week Two. Friday.

I’d been feeling down and depressed since the
events of Wednesday.

The Bust War had simmered down into a Cold Bust
War.

More than a few social cliques had re-organized
around the newly formed battle lines. I couldn’t help noticing how
the small breasted girls had grouped together as though for
protection from the large breasted ones. But it wasn’t smooth
sailing for those sporting a Cee cup or above. After one girl was
accosted in one of the toilets on the second floor, we bigger
busted individuals had taken to moving around in groups of two or
three. It seemed the teachers and administrators were handing out
detention notices every day, and while the situation had calmed
down a little, there appeared to be no sign of the tensions
abating.

This stupid rivalry had affected our friendship
with Alistair.

She was suspended like Caelum and didn’t attend
class, but she ignored my messages and my attempts to call her.

Siobhan had also tried calling Alistair and met
with the same wall of silence. She was angry and hurt by Alistair’s
behavior, but stopped short of paying Alistair a visit to give the
girl a piece of her mind. She said she’d known Alistair for a long
while and knew the latter was self-conscious of her figure. But
even she was surprised by the sudden sullen animosity Alistair was
expressing toward us.

Before morning homeroom I sent Caelum a message
to his palm-slate asking him how he was doing.

He replied back with an ‘all good’ and asked for
the class work he’d missed so far.

I took that to mean he was at least busy
studying while stuck in his dorm.

He didn’t ask about Duncan and I.

That made my heart fret.

I sent him a message telling him to study hard.
I wrote ‘love Haruka’ at the end, thought about it, then deleted
it.

I wrote ‘missing you’ instead and sent it to
him.

I received a reply before classes began.

MISSING YOU TOO.

It came in right after Duncan’s message, where
he pleaded to meet me after class today.

I’d been avoiding him since the beginning of the
week. I couldn’t put him off any longer. So I told him I’d meet him
after class at the cake shop, La Muse, a district block away far
from Galatea Academy.

His reply was almost immediate. He said he’d
wait for me all night if need be.

That pained my heart, and left my emotions
swirling in confusion.

I gave up trying to pay attention to Ms.
Fauntine during homeroom. It all went in one ear and out the other.
But as I sat there I came to accept the obvious truth.

I was caught between two loves.

My love for Caelum.

My growing love for Duncan.

And now I was going to have to choose.

I was going to have to
choose
!

And I couldn’t do that.

I just couldn’t….

#

(Caprice)

With Caelum suspended, I thought I’d spend my
lunches alone.

Instead, I found myself in the company of Maya,
Rina, and Constance.

In fact, I found myself spending a lot of time
in their company.

On Thursday morning, an hour and a half before
homeroom, the four of us met at the gym under the nightclub that
belonged to Arisa Imreh Lanfear – the same gym Caelum and I used to
train at for seven odd months. First, I had to get permission from
Arisa to do so. That I achieved on Wednesday night when I called
Arisa after our disastrous debut against Team Silia.

To put it simply, Silia and her group wiped the
floor with us.

We underestimated them because they didn’t
possess Fragments or Artifacts. To make up for that, the young
women of Team Silia were gifted with various weapons that mimicked
a Fragment. It was obvious from the first few minutes of combat
those four Aventis girls had trained long and hard with their
respective faux-Fragments.

We were handicapped on three fronts.

One, we’d never fought as a team. We didn’t know
what the other could do to complement our strengths or compensate
for our weaknesses.

Two, we weren’t allowed to use our Fragments to
maximum effect. I had to hold back with every strike and kick or I
was certain the Valkyrie Armor would shatter my opponents
faux-Fragment in a heartbeat.

And last but not least was problem three – Rina
Sayen.

Rina displayed excellent marksmanship…but
nothing else.

She was weak, slow, and lacked stamina to the
nth degree.

It was clear the Sora Pride had devoted little
resource to her training. Maya promised to speak to her mother
about that, but for now, we decided to go with my proposal – to use
the gym every morning in order to whip Rina into shape.

So on the journey back from the training habitat
– courtesy of Laurence who picked us up outside the entrance to
Artemis Industries – I made the call to Arisa and explained the
problem. Surprisingly, she needed little convincing, and we were
granted permission to train at the gym that was once used solely by
Caelum and I.

The agreement was that every morning we would
meet at the gym, oversee Rina’s training, and then shower, change
into our uniforms, and make our way to Galatea Academy.

Constance had proposed getting Rina to join the
Track-and-Field club but Maya and I vetoed the idea after Rina
began to cry from embarrassment. The girl really believed she’d
make a fool of herself before the members of the Track-and-Field
club. So she readily agreed to the alternative which was private
training. Since she was a Familiar, we were confident she could
attain a decent level of fitness in a few weeks, much faster than a
Regular person could. But we were going to have to push her hard,
yet avoid breaking her.

Thursday morning went well, though Rina
collapsed after fifteen minutes on the treadmill.

Thursday evening’s training was another
disaster. We spent too much time covering for Rina, and couldn’t do
enough for ourselves.

Friday morning it was back to the gym. This time
Rina lasted twenty minutes before dropping to her knees and sliding
off the back of the treadmill. However, we decided not to cut the
girl any slack. Maya put her through basic hand-to-hand combat
training. She spent another twenty minutes sparring with Maya until
she was too tired to lift her arms.

Watching Maya spar with Rina made me wonder how
long Maya had been training. Having seen her skills with the twin
okatanas, I realized it wasn’t a skill you learnt overnight. It
certainly wasn’t a skill you learnt in the span of a few months. It
was a level of skill you attained after years of dedicated
training. I was certain her hand-to-hand skills were also
considerably better than mine, and this wasn’t lost on Constance
either.

So the big question was: who is Maya Khayman
afil Sora?

I was curious but unfortunately that answer was
going to have to wait.

A quick shower, a hasty change into our
uniforms, and then it was off to Galatea Academy. That was a trip
via mag-lev from Habitat Two to Habitat One where the academy was
located. We bought our lunches from a convenience store outside the
station, then walked as a group to the school.

I hadn’t noticed it on Thursday, but I was
certainly aware of it on Friday morning as we walked into the
school – the reaction from the other students walking around
us.

It was clear they knew we four were Familiars,
but our being together elicited a range of emotions from the girls
and the boys, and they were disparate between the genders.

The girls gave us dark, disdainful looks, with a
touch of wariness thrown into the mix. It was clear they saw us as
a threat of some sort.

But the guys…they watched us with hunger in
their eyes.

I wouldn’t call it lust, but it came close.

Perhaps it was more accurate to describe it as
forbidden desire, and that made me feel conflicted.

On the one hand I felt uncomfortable as their
eyes watched our every move. Some girls describe it as feeling like
bait on a hook for a hungry predator.

But on the other hand, a heated warmth bloomed
in my chest. I was proud of the way I was drawing their undivided
attention.

I realized I wasn’t the only one who noticed
this.

Each of us was subconsciously and consciously
reacting to the attention in our own way.

Maya walked with her head high, her eyes
straight ahead, and with a definite, girlish swing of her hips. If
I had to describe her, I’d say she walked with the poise of a
fashion model.

Constance wasn’t far behind, with a powerful
gait that was fluid and light. She reminded me of a feline on the
prowl.

I wasn’t sure how I walked, maybe a little
taller, a little more confidently, but I certainly hoped I kept up
with Maya and Constance.

If anyone fell behind it was Rina.

She looked like she wanted to sprint on ahead
and hide in class.

She definitely did not enjoy the attention we
four attracted.

During lunch break we trekked to the small
grassy area behind the gym building built for the high-school
student body. The gym for the middle schoolers was on the opposite
side of the school grounds and near to their class rooms.

Learning our lesson from the day before, we each
carried small blankets with us that we lay on the ground to keep
grass stains off our uniforms.

We unboxed our convenience store lunches and
proceeded to dig in.

Rina stared miserably at her plastic lunch
container which held an assortment of salads and seafood, while
Maya placed a large data slate on the ground between the four of us
who sat in a circle facing inwards.

Maya said, “We need to work on our formations. I
don’t think we made decent use of Rina last night.”

I nodded. “I couldn’t keep that Artemis girl off
her back.”

As she spoke, Rina continued to stare unhappily
at her lunch box. “I can run and shoot but don’t expect me to hit
anything yet. I still haven’t synched up with the Gun Blade.” She
started picking at the salads with a plastic fork.

Constance shook her head. “You mean you can
shoot but can’t run.”