2049 AD
The cold Alpine air barely seeped into Interpol’s reinforced
training facility, but Jiro still felt it in his bones.
Not because of the temperature—he’d grown used to that—but
because of the silence. No drills. No scheduled sparring. No debriefs. Just him
and the hum of overhead lights in a temporary stillness called “leave.”
Three days off. A rare gift. Or a
punishment, wrapped in synthetic sheets and a too-clean dorm room.
Jiro sprawled across his bed, arms folded
behind his head. A holographic photo hovered over his head: He and Junio,
squinting against the Philippine sun, haloed in tropical greens and gold.
Another year, another trip to the islands. Another year Jiro wasn't allowed to
go.
“Government custody,” he muttered
bitterly. “Where vacations are nonexistent.”
Last
year was different. An exception. He and Junio trained together, fought
together, and got matching sunburns. It was a reward when he became vice captain. But this year, they said no. Something about protocol. Something about
boundaries.
Jiro turned over and buried his face into
the pillow. Unlike Junio, he didn’t have family connections that guaranteed he
could come to his hometown once a year. Life was unfair.
The door chimed.
He didn’t answer.
It slid open anyway.
Three kids walked in—teens, maybe a year
younger than him, but they moved like ghosts trained in silence. Identical dark
brown hair, sharp eyes that darted around like they were scanning the room for
threats. Two boys. One girl.
One boy grinned and nodded to him. “You’re
Jiro, right?”
Jiro sat up slowly. “You lost?” He was not
in the mood for company. This training facility had many children running
around because they were just that: children. He was just about to turn sixteen
himself. The governments of the world might want to treat them like soldiers,
but everyone here was below the age of eighteen. The youngest would be around
seven.
“Nope,” the other one replied, bouncing a
practice katana on his shoulder. “Hi, Uncle! We’re new.
From a different team. Thought we’d say hi.”
The girl said nothing. Her eyes were the
same pale gold as the sinking sun.
“Do I look like your uncle?”
The three laughed like it was some kind of
joke between them. It was definitely not a language barrier. “You wanna come
out to the yard?” the first one asked. “We’re doing drills.”
Jiro hesitated. He’d been told not to
engage with new units unless cleared. But three days off meant nothing if all
he did was sulk in his room. “Yeah,” he said, grabbing his own katana. He was
bored. “Sure. Why not?”
Outside, under a blanket of low clouds,
they trained on the southern field. Matteo—the first boy— moved like a dancer,
graceful and precise. Marco—the other one—was aggressive, his strikes
deliberate, almost theatrical. Jiro fell into rhythm easily, parrying,
correcting, and adapting.
They were thoroughly trained at a young
age, Jiro noted. A decade ago, monsters they called Nephilim emerged and
rampaged all throughout the planet. Godzilla
had nothing on them. No place was untouched. Jiro knew loss firsthand. His
own parents were killed in their quiet fishing village. A couple of years ago, he
manifested powers. Later, his younger sister manifested powers too. Not long,
Interpol recruited them.
Jiro’s powers were in speed and flight.
His sister had the power to control plants. His best friend turned into the
Philippine Tikbalang, a horse demon
of lore. But they all knew their powers were on borrowed time.
Children between seven and eighteen manifested powers. They don’t know
why or how. It was like a lottery. But all of them lost their powers at age
eighteen. They also don’t know why.
The governments and the various churches
have trained and hired these children to be Earth’s fighting force. Nothing
stopped Nephs, not bullets, not knives. Only the Angel-touched children and
their powers did.
Jiro’s grandparents signed him up for the
recruitment in Interpol, believing he’d get the best training. Jiro just wanted
to exterminate the Nephs, avenge his parents. Couple years ago, he met an
equally angry boy just a year older than him. He and Junio had been inseparable
since.
These three were triplets. Rare. Jiro has
heard of twins and siblings being Angel-touched, but he knew that triplets were
rare. The Kapre Twins were hailed as one of the greatest Neph Exterminator
pairs because of their kill count. Other twins didn’t necessarily have the same
powers. Siblings mostly didn’t. He had a younger sister, and she didn’t have
the same powers as he did.
Only then did the “grown-ups” realize that
the Kapre Twins had a much higher kill count together than apart. Too bad. They
turned eighteen last year, and their powers left. Now his best friend, Junio,
was able to beat Tino de Oro’s kill count. His commander said he’d rise to the
same position as he was next in line after Junio. Sucks to be him, to be valued
only as a kill count.
He observed the three. They were playful
but didn’t speak much. Asian but seem to understand multiple languages because
Jiro was speaking in Japanese and they seem to understand him.
“You hold it too stiff,” Jiro said to
Marco after a flurry of blows. “Relax your grip. You’re swinging like it’s a
hammer.”
Marco adjusted, then smirked as their
blades locked again. “Better?”
“Much.” He showed the proper way to slide
and slash.
Nearby, the girl—Lucrezia—stood still, her hands steady as she threw shuriken after shuriken into a tree trunk. Each one landed dead center. “She doesn’t fight up close?” Jiro asked, panting a little.
“Long-range only,” Matteo said. “Dad
doesn’t want her anywhere near the Nephs.”
“Who is your dad?” Because all they told
him was their name and that they were triplets. Jiro didn’t even know which
team they belonged to.
They seemed to have training, but perhaps
not in the government program for long, because they might be skilled, but they
were, in a way, undisciplined. They coordinated among themselves, but needed
more awareness of their surroundings.
“She’s just as deadly from a distance,”
Marco added. “You’ll see.” Before Jiro could ask what that meant, Marco
grinned. “Hey, you want in on a live test?”
“Want in on a what?”
“A field mission. Real Nephs. Real risk.”
Jiro blinked. “We’d need clearance—”
But they were already surrounding him. And
then—
The world faded.
***
The air was filled with salt and blood.
That’s what hit his nose first.
Jiro gasped as the sky above him turned
from gray to a tropical violet. Ocean waves crashed violently
nearby. Screams—both human and monstrous—echoed across the
sand.
They were somewhere in the tropics. He
could feel it in the air. It was warm. The air felt different, too.
“Fiji, 2048,” Lucrezia said.
“What
the hell—?!” Did she just say 2048?
“Neph incursion,” Matteo said, tossing
Jiro a candy. They each took a candy and ate it. Most Angel-touched children
needed a calorie hit to prevent a crash when fighting. “Keep up, J2!”
J2 was Junio’s nickname for him. Was this
the triplet’s power? Teleportation? But she said 2048. Jiro was so confused, but
he had no time to think.
The mermaids were nothing like the
legends. These had black eyes and razored tails and webbed hands sharpened into
claws. Their screams cracked the air. Nephs in aquatic form.
Nephilim, as the church called them, were monsters of biblical
proportion. They came out of nowhere. Their main goal was to devour
humans.
Training kicked in. He’s fought mermaids,
and he’d fought uglies before. This felt like another one of those days. With
his lightning speed, he made a beeline for the nearest Neph.
Marco charged, katana slashing cleanly
through a serpent-like neck. Lucrezia perched on a rocky outcrop, her shuriken
arcing through the air in deadly patterns, pinning one creature mid-scream.
They turned to dust upon dying.
Jiro fought back-to-back with Matteo. The
boy’s strikes mirrored his own so closely that it felt like sparring with
Junio. Although the boy didn’t have Junio’s speed, nor did he have Junio’s
powers, this boy held his own. Every motion was familiar.
Too familiar.
After a particularly brutal takedown, Jiro
turned, panting. “Where did you learn that strike?”
Matteo only smiled.
Jiro’s gaze slid to their katanas—identical to his and Junio’s. Same balance. Same markings. Same cross. Custom-made.
“Who are you?”
Marco wiped his blade clean. “We’ll
explain. Later.”
They teleported into another part of the
island and chased more Nephs. Jiro partnered with Matteo, while Marco teamed up
with Lucrezia. Matteo was keeping up with his movements, even teleporting to
compensate for his lack of speed. These kids were uncanny. He swore it felt so
familiar.
There were about a hundred Nephs. The two
pairs were deadly and made quick work of the enemy, saving the locals. When the
local Neph Extermination Team stepped up, the four of them left.
The triplets brought him back to the
facility just before lights out. The same hallways. The same sterile hum. But
everything had shifted.
“What. In. The. World!” Jiro wanted
answers. These three were uncanny. He’d get in trouble just for being out of
the facility without permission.
The two boys grinned from ear to ear while
Lucrezia sighed at their antics. “That was fun.”
“No, it wasn’t!” Jiro knew he could be
reckless at times. With his speed, he could get out of the facility and hang
somewhere with no one the wiser. These kids were on a whole new level. They
could teleport anytime, anywhere. Any. Time.
“I’m hungry!” Matteo complained.
“Me too! Got any of those cheese bombs?”
Marco asked.
Jiro frowned. They were all wiped from the
excursion. “Why not?” He got up and riffled through his kitchenette. Although
there was a cafeteria where he could get food, he preferred to keep snacks in
his room for midnight meals. Since fighting burned a lot of calories, they were
given a kitchenette in each room.
The little cheese bombs were handmade
ahead of time and were kept in his mini fridge. Junio loved his cheese bombs.
He turned to the three kids who were sitting on his bed. They started to rifle
through his manga collection.
They were huddled over a particularly
violent manga where he and Junio used to copy the main character’s stance. It
was a fantasy-historical manga. He swore the triplets were speaking in a mix of
Japanese, Bisaya, and English.
He served the cheese bombs and
mysteriously found sandwiches, chips, and juice boxes littered in his bed. They
all sat to eat. He looked at the three of them. “Did Junio put you guys up to
this?” They could be a cousin from back home or something. They resembled Junio
somewhat.
The three erupted into laughter.
“What’s so funny?”
“Nothing, uncle. Today was fun,” the
little girl said. They shared their sandwiches, chips, and juice as they
recounted their mermaid extermination.
“Matteo should learn to duck lower and
swing wider. Marco, you should be more graceful. Lucrezia, you have to learn to
use a knife or sword in case an enemy gets up close,” he said.
“We’ll practice,” Matteo said. The other
two nodded.
Before leaving, Lucrezia turned to him,
soft-voiced for the first time. “Don’t tell him. Not yet.”
“Why not?” Jiro demanded. Because it all
made sense. “He’s my brother. He’ll find out.” He knew they were referring to
Junio. These three were related to Junio and they didn’t belong at this time.
Matteo nodded. “Exactly. One day. Just…
let this moment be ours for now.”
“Ours?”
Marco reached out, gripping Jiro’s
shoulder firmly. He had tears in his eyes. “We just wanted to get to know you,
uncle. One day, you’ll understand. He’ll understand, too.”
“I want to ask you so many things.”
Lucrezia shook her head. “It’s not time.
One day, it will be.”
Matteo, Marco, and Lucrezia stood side by
side, shoulders touching. In a flash of light, they disappeared. Jiro frowned.
Who were these mysterious teleporting triplets? They disappeared just like
that, leaving only empty wrappers and juice boxes as proof of their
existence.
He was cleaning his room when Junio barged
in. “Had a party?”
Jiro tied the full garbage bag. “Something
like that. Some kids from a different team came by and said hi.”
“Know them?”
He looked at Junio closely. The resemblance was uncanny. He looked like an older version of Matteo and Marco. “I might. They looked familiar.”
“I didn’t see anyone in the hallway.”
Junio picked up the remaining cheese bombs and ate them. “Are they joining our
team?”
Jiro
shook his head. “I don’t know, but something tells me they’ll drop by again.”
He noted the gold cross that was tied to Junio’s katana, the same one tied to
Matteo’s katana. “How come you’re early?”
Junio shrugged. “Damaso called. There’s
another mission.”
“Let’s go.”
This story is a mini adventure set in the world of Neph XY. Follow the adventures of Stanzo, Junio and the Triplets!
