“Are you absolutely sure you want to use the name Scale?” The chairman rapped his fingers on the table in a rhythmic manner; it sounded like a horse’s hooves clopping. His head shined in the office-style overhead lighting. His slightly flushed cheeks made him look like a half-ripened tomato.

  “Yes,” said Scale. “It’s precious to me.” She crossed her legs and leaned back. The leather chair squeaked and groaned.

  “But won't people figure out your identity? It’s not exactly a common name.”

  “Doesn’t matter. The point of keeping a secret identity would be to protect my family, but Lyss’s already an S-rank.”

  “Indeed. Watergss doesn’t really need any protection.”

  “You can only imagine.” Scale chuckled. Her white hair bounced on her shoulders. The Chairman's expression made her ugh.

  “Well then,” the Chairman cleared his throat, “I’ll have one of our clerks bring up your new ID. I’ll brief you on the identity we set up…”

  Brrring. Brrring. An obnoxious ringtone trilled. Half asleep, the building manager fumbled through his pockets.

  “This is Jeremy,” he said after picking up.

  “Hello Mr. Higgs, this is Mark from the Guild’s IT department.”

  “The IT department? Why the fuck are you calling me so early?” The clock on the wall behind him dispyed the time digitally: 10:46am.

  “You asked us to look into something for you and I was calling to follow up on that investigation. The information we found is interesting.”

  “Oh right the icy bitch. Shit I forgot—” the sound of empty cans falling overid Jeremy’s next works, making them incomprehensible. “Anyways, tell me. Is it safe to fuck her up?”

  “... We aren’t completely sure. At first we couldn’t find anything because she’s not American. She has no socials either, like a ghost, so we immediately assumed she was an Awakener.”

  “Nah I didn’t feel anything like that from her. I would have detected mana if she had it.”

  “We took that into account. There are only a few possibilities if she was an awakener that you couldn’t sense. Either she has an ability reted to stealth or her abilities are so weak that you didn’t notice anything.” The IT department head left off the third possibility because the odds were too low and after their investigations it seemed irrelevant.

  “So you’re sure she’s an Awakened?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s perfect, means she won't break easy.”

  “We found her profile in the Association’s database. She’s listed as an unaffiliated D-rank combat support visiting abroad. Canadian. Purpose for travel is tourism.”

  “Combat support? That’s rare.”

  “Exactly. The Guild Leader wants to recruit her.”

  “So don’t break her too bad?” Jeremy licked his lips as he kicked his feet up on the desk. “I can handle that. Do you know where she’s staying?”

  “No. Her personal details are mostly bnk. We only know her st name.”

  “Then how the fuck am I supposed to find her? Do your damn job, you fucking nerds. Next time just text me this shit instead of wasting my time.”

  —Click—

  Jeremy’s reflection in the bck screen of his phone after hanging up startled him. He clicked his tongue and rubbed the stubble sprouting on his chin.

  “I should shave.”

  “We’ve registered Scale Altiman as a D-rank Awakener from Canada with privacy settings enabled, so only your st name, registered ability type, and photo can be seen. We did some research on your father’s movements and found he made a trip there that matches the timeline well. You’ll be recorded as a 25 year old support css awakener from Toronto. In exchange for granting this favor you’ll have to help with at least one major gate crisis up north sometime, but we didn’t think you’d disagree.”

  “Sounds fine to me. I always liked the Leafs anyways. Ah, by the way, how sturdy would you say this ID card is?”

  “It’s minated pstic.”

  “Ah. So I should probably just leave it at home…”

  “Oh this is about the clothes issue,” said the chairman with a grin. “You know, we have special uniforms that are heavily resistant to friction. If you want we can have one fitted for you.”

  “That would be perf—”

  “We’ll deduct the cost from your earnings, of course. The bounty for the gate you closed yesterday should just about cover it.”

  “You bald bastard!” Scale was sick of relying on her family. It was embarrassing to have her room and board covered by her sister. It hurt her pride.

  “Though, if you wanted to keep that money…” The chairman’s eyes narrowed as he stretched out the end of the sentence. He looked like a bandit eyeing a sack of gold. “Perhaps we can be convinced, assuming you’re willing to agree to an interview.”

  As a dragon, Scale had a powerful intuition. Right now her intuition was warning her about the presence of a predator. There was a knock at the door.

  “Boss, this is Hannah. I brought the ID and bank card.” The new woman entered the room before being told. She paused when she finally got a good look at Scale in the chair.

  “Ah! The dy from the apartment! The one that wanted to warn me about the creep running the pce.” Scale spun around in the leather chair and pointed. She smiled and added, “What a small world.”

  “I guess it is. Looks like I was just meddling, huh?”

  “Seems like you two have already met. That makes things easier. This is Hannah Nguyen, one of our clerks,” said the chairman. “But her real job is—”

  “Propaganda.” Hannah cut into the conversation like a seasoned pro. “I use my ability to livestream. You might know me as Hana the Gossip.”

  “Oh!”

  “Have you seen my streams before?”

  “No. I haven’t seen a livestream in a long time,” said Scale. “I was just excited. Feeling the mood and all.” An awkward silence followed.

  “Hannah here wanted to do an interview with you,” said the Chairman. “She mentioned some reporters might start looking into you soon. So we thought this could be a good chance to get ahead of the game.”

  “Ah. That’s probably fine. Oh, but can I get that uniform first? I don’t want to show up on a stream wearing rags.” Her current outfit was fine but Scale knew the moment she transformed it would be shredded.

  “Sure. Let me make a call to the supply department. The computer has your measurements in your transformed state already. It should only take a few hours to prep.” The chairman picked up the phone from his desk with a grin. “You two should go get lunch. Get to know each other in the meantime and pn out the details of the stream.”

  “What color will the uniform be?”

  “The dynamic fibers can change color and design at the press of a button. We have Production Hunters on payroll who make some dyn-o-mite stuff.”

  “You don’t need to sell it to me.”

  “I really do. Until you sign an exclusive contract with us—”

  “Don’t make it weird, please. I told you I’d think about it already.”

  “Your name is Scale, right?” Hana stepped in to change the subject.

  “Yeah.”

  “Do you like chow mein? I know a great noodle pce.”

  “Don’t just interrupt me when I’m trying to recruit—”

  “Shut up, America’s Buddha!”

  “Buddha?” Scale tilted her head in confusion.

  “Hannah!” The Chairman growled and his desk snapped in half. He stood up from his seat but Hannah was already running away. She grabbed Scale’s hand and dragged her out of the room the moment she said the B-word.

  “Run run run!” Hannah ughed. Scale stumbled behind her, confused but going with the flow. They passed several people in a rush.

  “Hannah is causing trouble again?”

  “Looks like it.”

  “What a precocious child.”

  “Kids should be healthy and active like that.”

  The people in the executive lobby smiled and chatted amongst each other. Everyone here had high level clearance, being A-rank or higher in the Association, so they had some understanding of the situation. Several had been at Scale’s returnee gate. These also happened to be the oldest members of the Association, with the average age being 68.

  Several staplers and books flew through the air behind the running Hannah. Most missed the target but a few bounced off of her. One binder exploded into a blizzard of paper.

  “Ah youth~”

  “You and the Chairman seem close,” said Scale. She sipped on her chocote milkshake. Her body bounced with each step like a celebrating child.

  “He’s the one that brought me into the Association when I was a kid,” said Hannah. “He found me and my brother when we were in a bad pce. Took us in and got us on our feet.” The two were walking down the street towards the aforementioned noodle pce but had stopped to get milkshakes on a whim. Now that she had actual money, Scale intended to enjoy it. She had always lived so frugally back in her first life. Now she wanted to enjoy luxury, even if just for a moment.

  “So he’s basically your dad? Is that why you tease him so much?”

  “That’s a good way to think of it.”

  The noodle shop they came to was small and out of the way, buried in a deep alley. The smell of oil overwhelmed Scale. They sat down and Hannah ordered a bunch of food in a different nguage. Scale didn’t know what nguage it was nor did she feel like using magic to decipher it. Sometimes it was nicer to just enjoy the atmosphere and not understand everything.

  “Not a lot of people here,” said Scale.

  “The owners here are nice people but their prices are a bit high.”

  “Have you known them long?”

  “My whole life.”

  Within 10 minutes several bowls of food were brought out.

  “Oh this is good!” Scale enjoyed the food.

  “I’m gd! So, while we eat, let's get onto the main topic. I’m guessing you don’t care too much if your human face is exposed, right?”

  “Yeah. It’s really not a big deal.”

  “That’s good. I don’t intend to have you show it off, though. Instead I want to do the opposite. I heard from the chairman that you have a dragon form. Can we show that off instead? Maybe we have you start as a half-dragon and then take your dragon form part way through?”

  “I’m not against it but then we’d need a big open space to do it, and we’d need to make a public announcement to make sure people don’t panic. I’m quite big.”

  “No need to worry, I thought about that already! I’ve been wanting to test a new device my brother made that should let me livestream from inside a gate.”

  “That’s possible? I only remember seeing recordings of gate exploration before, never a stream.”

  “It hadn’t been, but my little brother has been working on this for a while now. So now I want you to test it with me! What do you say?”

  Scale didn’t have a reason to decline. She smiled as she took another bite of some crunchy noodles. With a nod she said, “Sure. Let’s do it.”