Episode Ember Grover: Chapter 1: The Key

Chapter 1 of Ember Grover's adventure.

A Name

A Legacy

A History

Tied Together

Damaged By a Piece

Of that Legacy

Who are You

When the World Only Sees

Your Shadow?

 

 

 

The Island of Patch

ZERO YEAR

Day 32

 

 

 

 

            Ember sat on the shoreline not far from her house, listening to the waves crash against the shoreline.  Something she had been doing just about every day since the war came to an end.  Just watching the waves crash and letting her mind wander.  Given how early in the school year the war took place, there were still some very nice days that allowed Ember to stay here like this.  But the passed soon as the sun started to set and the cool early fall air began to sweep over the island.  Ember slowly got up and made her way back to her house, not even bothered by the cold.  She walked in and saw her mother preparing baked potatoes for the two of them for dinner.

            “Did you manage to get the firewood chopped like I asked?” Yang yelled towards Ember as she checked the oven.

            “Sorry mom” Ember said with a sigh.  “Forgot.  I’ll do that right quick.”

            “Do what you can, dinner’s maybe fifteen minutes away.”

            “Sure thing.”  Ember sighed and went back out into the backyard and grabbed one of the training swords that Gray used to use for sparring practice.  She then walked over to the small stump and pile of logs where one was already placed and used her Semblance to get the sword to phase through the middle of the log.  As soon as that was done, she deactivated her Semblance and the log split in half.  There were concerns early on when Ember first discovered her Semblance that if she accidentally stopped phasing through objects, she would have her internal organs harmed by whatever physical object was going through them, if her arm was stuck in a door it might get cut off or something horrific.  But it turned out that her phasing created a strange anomaly if it stopped mid-phasing.  If Ember herself is stuck in a door, then some small part of her body taps into an emergency reserve and forces energy out of the body to push herself out of the object she’s phasing through. And if that is not possible, then her body would force out the object itself like an explosion.  There was a time where Ember was trying to phase through a giant wall and accidentally stopped phasing, and her body quickly pushed every part of the wall that was “inside” Ember’s body outwards creating a strange looking bubble around her inside the wall.  And a similar effect would happen when she used this technique on objects.  In the case of the sword in the log, she caused the log to essentially split in half because the sword could not keep the phased elements of the log within itself.  However, studies determined she was not able to use her ability to force explosions in living beings.  Only non-living objects.  Which made splitting logs more of a matter of Aura management than true strength.  Ember finished splitting the pile of logs and moved them over to the small shed that her family had used for years.  After which, she took a few logs and brought them in to place them within the fireplace to help keep the fire lit.  She walked over and grabbed a few items from the refrigerator and began setting the table for the two of them.  As she sat down, Yang placed a glass filled with milk in front of Ember, went back to the stove, then placed two plates with beautifully baked potatoes with a few trimmings in front of their respective seats.  As Yang sat down and Ember started eating, the two of them started eating in silence.  After a few minutes of this, Yang finally broke the silence.

            “Arri called again” she said as she placed her fork off to the side.

            “She could’ve just texted me directly” Ember said as she took another bite of her potato.

            “According to her, she has.   You’ve just been ignoring her” Yang said as she leaned forward towards her daughter.

            “I guess I haven’t been paying attention” Ember said still trying to deflect her mother’s comments.  “Do you need me to get anything from the market tomorrow?”

            “Can we talk about this please?” Yang pleaded, her voice becoming far more concerned.  “We haven’t talked about what happened a month ago beyond the initial event.”

            “Tell you what mom,” Ember said letting her clenched fist hit the table, “when you’ve had to fight your own parent....”

            “You know I have.”

            “Grandma Raven was different.  She started off as a terrible person then you fought her and she tried to become better.  This was the inverse.  He was a hero, now he’s arguably the greatest villain in Remnant’s recent memory.”

            “Ember…..”

            “And I had to fight him!  I probably would have had to kill him if he hadn’t absorbed all that power!  Because he was going to kill me without hesitation!  I know Grandma Raven wasn’t a great mother….”

            “Doubt she ever was to begin with” Yang said under her breath.

            “….but she made an effort to try and be better.  And when you did fight her, did you ever feel that she was actually going to kill you?”  Yang fell silent at her daughter’s question.  “That’s what I thought” Ember said as she dropped her fork onto the table.  She stood up and made her way to her bedroom.  She collapsed onto her bed and just fell right asleep.  No dreams to soothe her, no nightmares to terrify her.  Simply sleep in a world that no longer made sense.

 

 

 

 

The Next Day

 

 

 

            Ember sorted through some of the different fruits available at the central market in the town square of the capital of Patch.  She tried to keep her hat positioned in a way that most folks wouldn’t recognize her, but the fact that she had come from her family house was a dead giveaway.  Folks watched and stared as Ember picked through the different produce items available for purchase.  She couldn’t hear exactly what was being said, but the whispers sometimes carried small pieces on the wind.

            “….her father…..betrayer……is she like him…….what was her name?”  Ember had heard these whispers every time she went to the market since her father had been defeated, taken into custody, and then subsequentially escaped.  She had become a master at tuning out these whispers, but today they seemed especially noticeable.  Shaking it off, she started to walk back towards her house.  But as she began to leave, one of the many onlookers walked up to her.  Ember tried to ignore them, but this onlooker stepped in front of Ember, blocking her path.  Ember looked up at the stranger, slightly confused.  It was a woman not that much older than she was, wearing a white coat with black trim as well as a small white hat.  She had blue eyes with white hair and seemed almost unsure of herself as she seemed almost embarrassed to be in this particular situation.

            “Uh….” Ember wondered aloud tilting her head as she looked at the stranger in front of her, “have you been helped?”

            “Sorry,” the stranger said as she lowered her head nervously.  “I don’t mean to intrude.  I just wanted to say how sorry I was for everything that happened with your father.”  Ember was taken aback at this statement.

            “….thanks?” she responded with an air of confusion.  “This is not normally how these conversations go down.”

            “Sorry to hear that” the stranger said as she scratched her head.  “But listen, there is something I wanted to tell you.”

            “And what might that be?”

            “I….am a….” the stranger seemed to be struggling with what to say.  “A caretaker at the cemetery.  And given your father’s…. actions, I’ve had to clean his headstone more often than not.”

            “That thing is still up?” Ember said with surprise.  “I figured it would have been taken down by now.”

            “Your mother still hasn’t filed the paperwork on that front.  Regardless, I’ve been trying to keep it clean, but the other day I found something.”  As she said this, the stranger pulled out a small key from her coat pocket and handed it to Ember.  “I don’t know what it is, but I figured it should go to the family.”

            “….why a key?” Ember asked as she accepted the strange gift.

            “Most of what I’ve had to clean up is garbage and graffiti” the stranger said with a weak smile.  “And said garbage is strewn about haphazardly, very little regard for placement.  But this key, this was seemingly placed deliberately upon the headstone.  So it might mean something.  I’m not entirely sure what exactly just yet, but I figured you should have it.”  Ember looked over the key, trying to see if she recognized it.  It was rather small, about the size of a house key, but it seemed to have unique markings engraved on the bow that seemed rather familiar.

            “So why give this to me and not drop it off at my house in the mail or something like that?” Ember asked.  But as she raised her head, she noticed the stranger was gone.  She was standing alone at the edge of the market, and the other onlookers were staring at her as if she were crazy.  Ember shook her head and made her way back home.

 

 

 

 

            “I’m home!” Ember yelled as she opened the kitchen door.  There wasn’t a response, so she looked around for a note.  She didn’t see one, but then her Scroll buzzed.  It was a text from her mother saying,

            “Sorry, forgot to mention I have errands to run in Vale.  I’ll be back before lunch.”  Ember sighed as she put the produce she got from the market into their proper places for storage.  Once she finished that, she pulled out the key the stranger gave her and began examining it.  She couldn’t shake the feeling she had seen this symbol somewhere before.  She continued to fiddle with it as she mindlessly wandered around the house.  Time passed without much thought when suddenly Ember noticed she was in her parent’s old bedroom.  Her mother still used the bed, but the half that was used by her father had been collecting dust for quite some time.  Ember started to turn to leave, but then something caught her eye.  The light from the window hit the purple of her father’s old school uniform and she noticed something.  Just beneath the collar of the outfit, there was a symbol that matched the symbol engraved on the bow of the key.  Ember gave it a quick once-over to confirm, and it was in fact the same sigil.  But that wasn’t enough to know what exactly this key was supposed to unlock.  So she started looking in different cervices that her father might have kept tucked away over the years.  She checked small boxes, cabinets, nothing seemed to lead towards what this key unlocked.  As she made her way to the basement, she looked around at some of the old stuff that used to belong to her father that her mother had moved down over the course of the past month.  If she didn’t know any better, she would have assumed a hoarder lived in the basement.  And it made it difficult to try and find anything hidden because everything was either stacked precariously or buried amongst more stuff.  Ember took a deep breath and started going through everything.  Like her mother, she had avoided coming down here after learning what her father had become due to the memories the items held, but with the advent of the key, she pressed on.  She pulled out boxes and different random objects hoping perhaps the key would open one of them, but to no avail.  As she continued to make her way through however, she accidentally tripped and fell over, causing one of the towers of stuff to collapse.  She quickly activated her Semblance and let the items fall through her, but they then fell into other stacks causing them to fall over, creating an avalanche of old junk.  After it all collapsed, Ember winced as she stood up and saw the mess, as well as one last tower wobbling near the wall.  She rolled her eyes, and just marched over and pushed it over herself.

            “That’s what you get for having more junk than a hoarder dad” Ember said as it began to topple over.  But as it did, it hit the wall and made a hollow sound, knocking a panel loose and revealing a keyhole.  Ember walked towards it, and tried inserting the key into it.  It fit perfectly.  She turned it, and a panel slid up from the wall revealing a secret door.  She took the key back out and saw that another keyhole was waiting by this new secret door.  As she inserted the key, a new panel popped up asking for a handprint.  Ember looked at it and realized it was more than likely asking for Nathan’s exact DNA.  She was nervous it might not accept her hand given that even though part of his DNA flowed through her blood, her mother’s DNA also was a part of her.  As she pondered this, she suddenly snapped upright, looked at the door, facepalmed, then simply phased through the door.

            “Now I can see why dad hid this behind a wall panel” she said pinching her forehead at her inability to use her Semblance right away.  As she made her way in, she used the flashlight on her Scroll to locate the light switch.  She turned it on hoping her father didn’t have the foresight to have the room not activate without his handprint.  Thankfully he did not as fluorescent lights lit up a small command center.  There was a holo-table in the middle of the room and a few monitors on two tables flanking it, and a door on the other side of the room that Ember believed lead to the outside for either the Sons of Aequo or the Order to pick him up away from prying eyes.  As she looked over the room, she saw a few briefing files were pre-loaded on the holo-table.  She pulled one up and suddenly her father wearing his Sons of Aequo uniform appeared on the table.

            “Continuing with the report on the great ruins that pepper the land of Remnant” Nathan’s voice came in through the hologram.  Ember clenched her fist a bit seeing him, but tried to remain focused on what he was saying.

            “According to the reports from Anima about the True Order,” Nathan said as a hologram of the ruins of the Emerald Forest appeared, “they have been researching these ruins for years.  It is said they are connected to an ancient magic that could be related to the Order and the Relics.  If we manage to find these answers, we can perhaps begin to formulate a plan to liberate the Relics from Ozpin and begin the necessary work to bring the true Ember back.”  Having said that, the hologram ended, leaving Ember to continue to stew in her anger.  Even after her confrontation with him, hearing those words of the “true” Ember made her blood boil.

            “I wonder if Em made you change your view of that mindset” Ember said with a growl.  But she shook herself back to composure, and exited the room.  She got upstairs and her mother still wasn’t back yet.  She grabbed a piece of paper and wrote a quick note.

            “Sorry about the mess in the basement, but I found something.  Going to check it out real quick, will try to be back before dinner.  Please don’t clean up the mess downstairs, I messed it up so I’ll clean it.”  With that, she ran upstairs, changed into her combat clothes, grabbed her tonfas, and grabbed the spare airship and began making her way towards the Emerald Forest.

Author's Note

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