Hugo kept checking all the rooms one by one, eventually making his way upstairs. He stopped at the gallery overlooking the lounge. After removing a necklace he was wearing, he stopped to check where his team was. Ella and Gina were with him, Marcus and Camille were looking through the shelves in the lounge with Vincent trailing behind them, while Neil was still in the Kitchen.
"Everyone," Hugo called. The people downstairs gathered in the lounge. "Just gather in the lounge but keep away from the centre," he said.
They all walked to the edges of the room.
With the necklace in hand, the captain raised his right arm up above his bowed head. With closed eyes, he quietly said, "Keeper Evengis, reveal thy abode…"
The gang gawked, stunned at what followed. The entire house began evaporating in light smoke and, from underneath, an eerie picture revealed itself. The rooms changed colour, the furniture changed shape, all the shelves with decoration became bookshelves, even the curtains were now different, and everything had been wrecked. The place had been burnt in places, torn apart in some, and destroyed all over. The books lay scattered everywhere, many torn and blackened. The chairs and sofas were also strewn about and even the walls had holes punched in them. It was a gloomy sight indeed.
Hugo looked at her and said, "This is what you were feeling, Ella."
"What is this place?" Gina asked moving closer to him.
"This," the captain replied, "is what's left of the actual Keeper's Post…"
"Almost everything here is giving off a mixed Ki residue," Ella said, observing the trashed furniture.
Hugo nodded then gathered everyone's attention once more. "Alright, listen up," he said. "Look for anything that could give us an actual trace. It's quite impossible to track a Keeper but we can track their attackers. So, look for a trace. Any trace. And be thorough."
The squad began searching once more. They could now feel exactly what Ella was sensing earlier. Continuously turning around looking over their shoulders to find no one there. They found it hard to focus and felt a heaviness – the entire squad shifted uneasily within the Post.
When Hugo walked back downstairs, Camille approached him and asked, "Can you please explain to us what these Keepers actually are?" She paused, then added, "We are all having a real hard time here."
"I can understand," the captain nodded.
"So?"
"I've already explained it, Cami. They're one with nature."
"What else? What do they do? Why is this place so… so… heavy and uncomfortable? It's almost too hard to breathe in here."
After a long sullen silence, Hugo nodded. "Alright," he said and began searching again. The squad followed suit.
"A Keeper is a guardian of Earth," the captain explained. "Giving ourselves these fancy names, we call ourselves 'guardians' while our counterparts, the Order, call themselves 'saviours' or 'protectors'. But these people are different. They don't describe themselves like we do, nor do they announce their existence. They are custodians of knowledge that benefits us all but is not readily available or accessible. They are like a giant walking library that no one is meant to know about unless it's appropriate. And it's these same Keepers who also have the wisdom to understand who needs this knowledge and when."
"One question, bro," said Camille, bent next to a burnt bookshelf. "Are they…"
"Did I say I was done?" Hugo interrupted, without looking away from the shelf. "Let me finish, and then ask."
She shot him a deadpan glance and turned her gaze away, only to meet Vincent's amused eyes. He chuckled and looked elsewhere.
"With this knowledge and wisdom, Keepers look after a very different side of our world." Hugo sighed. "They don't care much for men waging wars on the helpless or calamities wreaking havoc on the innocents. They are more worried about the metaphysical trouble… they look after the metaphysical plane of existence, not the physical."
Marcus kicked aside a charred plank and crouched near a half-burnt shelf.
"If these guys are supposed to be all that," he muttered, flipping through a scorched book, "they've got a pretty terrible security system."
The pages crumbled in his hands.
The group was still confused. But Hugo's explanation had stopped.
Casually strolling through the wreckage, the White Bolt broke the awkward silence.
"They are students of Ayn, Zaatsu," he said. "The metaphysical part of their academy syllabi was very conveniently skipped." After a pause, he added, "Maybe because the teachers themselves never read it…"
Everyone stared at Hugo in anticipation.
Hugo exhaled slowly. "We are not the only ones who occupy the Earth," he eventually explained, never taking his eyes off the rubble. "Let's see… apart from humans, Djinns are also residents of our world, many angels come and go, and even Celestials and Demons sometimes escape through to our side… and that's to name just a few."
The captain finally took a quick look at Vincent.
"Most of us only interact with the physical, which forms a very tiny part of our reality." Squatting next to a broken shelf, the Zaatsu glanced at his squad. "The rest, that invisible or metaphysical, does exist. It's right here, it exists, and it affects us in more ways than we can know. To keep the balance, stabilize the boundaries between the two sides to this coin, and to deal with any mishaps, is the job of a Keeper."
"They are keepers of balance," Ella said, in a near-whispering tone, and then asked, "So, are they not human?"
"No. These people are as human as anyone will ever be. Their expertise, their knowledge, is just in a different field and that is what makes them special… or… aaa… different."
Camille picked up a blackened book, its spine cracked, pages fused together. She tried to pry it open, but the paper disintegrated into ash between her fingers.
"Whatever they were protecting…" she murmured, "someone didn't want it read."
Neil nudged a collapsed chair with his foot.
"All this talk about balance and hidden worlds…" he said. "Looks like a break-in to me."
He looked at his captain. "And nobody is supposed to know their true identity," Neil mused. "Nobody can meet them either, right? Then how could someone attack them."
Vincent dragged a finger along a broken wall, watching the soot gather at his fingertips before brushing it away. He whispered, "That's the million dollar question…"
"Not really," Hugo replied, glancing at his brother. "People do find them and learn from them. They have disciples and people they guide, and for the last few hundred years, the Eye has been keeping a list of them as well… albeit not a comprehensive one."
"A list of all Keepers?" Neil asked.
"Not all of them."
"Why not all?"
Vincent giggled as he shook his head. "Hu-hu-hu… boy, I love this. Tell em, Master Baylis."
Staring at him, Hugo said, "Keepers supposedly have a tiered system, with each next tier smaller in number than the previous and all the more important." He then looked away saying, "The Eye has a list of some Keepers, not all. But remember, we only know what they willingly reveal."
Ella paused mid-step, her hand hovering over a cracked wall.
"This Ki…" she whispered. "It's like something alive inside was ripped out."
Vincent, standing a few paces to her right, looked over. "One with nature," he said. "That's what it means. Their Ki is connected with everything. And that's why even an inanimate wall gives off the feeling of having a soul."
Ella looked at him and asked, "And you know all this how exactly?"
He shrugged saying, "Bought from the black markets."
"I have a question," Camille chimed in. "What would someone gain by attacking these people when most of us can never even interact with them or the stuff they deal with?"
"The name 'Keeper' was coined by compatriots of the Sanctums of Prostasia, the Eye and the Order's precursor movement of defenders. These people are guardians of many artifacts of importance to humans and other beings alike. Of these artifacts are the Scriptures of Dark Arts, written by Rasalhague himself."
"Well, that makes sense."
"So, they protect the world from threats beyond understanding." Marcus shrugged then chuckled. "They're doing a pretty bang-up job of it."
Hugo dropped the plank in his hand and gave the Sokidu a stern look.
"What?" he said. "I'm a believer, man."
Gina then asked, "If the Eye only has a list of some Keepers, and I'm assuming they are the ones interacting with us, then how can we be sure that they are the only ones being attacked?"
Vincent sat down on a settee with a loud breath. He threw away the half-burnt book in his hand.
"Rumours and calculated guesses say that there are 71 Keepers at any given time." He dusted the ash off his fingers. "From these, seven are top tier, most unreachable and unrecognizable, then a tier of 17, a bit more reachable. And from the remainder you draw up a list at your Palace."
Moving a step closer, Neil said, "How is that relevant to the question?"
"The list you have are of the ones willing to reveal themselves to you." Vincent ran a hand through his hair. "Even if any of the top tier ones are getting attacked, there is a good chance that even other Keepers will not be alerted."
Wide-eyed, Niel smirked. "And where are you pulling this information from? The black markets?"
The bounty hunter chuckled. "Master Shimusa," he said. "He was the greatest master after the trinity and mentor to Lord Julias Ceasar himself. He wrote a book once. The translated name of this book is 'The Marauders of the Hidden'. He wrote in it the tales of his great adventures in search of the chosen ones. Just a few copies of the book remain with some Cults, written in old, ancient Persian script. One Cult has a translated copy as well, but it isn't an authentic translation."
Scratching his neck, he added, "In any case, everyone cites his work and gives the Keepers a total tally of 71. Even the Order, who believe Keepers are nothing more than covert, clandestine operatives of the Eye, say there are 71 of them."
Thereafter, everyone began searching again. Ella tried using a Mystics' tracing technique to find something useful but to no avail.
Suddenly, Vincent chuckled.
Everyone looked back at him.
"He's not the only one," he said. "Only one other person has ever talked about the Keepers in any detail and quite frankly, his works are far too controversial for you people to read."
The squad exchanged a few looks. Neil asked, "Who is it?"
"A Mystic by the name of…"
"Abnus Ali," Hugo said, completing his sentence.
"God bless you," said Vincent, smiling.
Camille asked, "Who's that?"
"Exactly my point," the bounty hunter quickly answered. "You never hear about him. He was a Mystic before Mystics were a thing, or at least that is what they say." Hugo shook his head while Vincent further asked, "Do you people know of the war that laid waste to the Sanctum of Prostasia?"
"Of course."
"Who led the victory charge?"
"Master Lasidan Yuba, the man who also established the Eye."
"Right answer, but wrong detail. He won the war, but he never established the Eye. It was established 50 years after the war and 40 years after Yuba died. Anyways… Yuba and almost all his generals were graduates from the monastery of Abnus Ali who wrote an awful lot about the metaphysical world, or as he termed it, and I translate, the Cosmogenic World."
"Master?" Camille said interrogatively, looking at her elder stepbrother. "Is this true?"
Rubbing his eyes, the captain said, "Abnus Ali has been described as a Sufi – a man with no material desires and a formidable connection with the Universal Ki – a concept still debated within the Palace Halls."
Looking at his sister, he further said, "But the vast majority describes him as nothing more than a sharp-witted vagabond. And by the way, there is no connection between him and the Sanctuary in recorded history."
"Ah…" the bounty hunter gestured with a gasp and a smile, then dropped his head. "Interesting, isn't it?"
He stood up and turned away saying, "Whosever shall record the events shall also have the liberty to distort the said events and bend the narrative to the prevalent bias."
"And who is to say which is the truth and which is the lie?" Hugo asked. "The distorted event or the prevalent bias?"
"Believe what you will, Zaatsu. No one can tell you otherwise."
But before the conversation could move on, the bounty hunter poked Hugo once more.
"And you forgot to tell them a Keeper's most important job…" he said.
Camille looked on with a widening gaze. "Yeah?" she said. "And what's that?"
"They provide us with the capacity to do what we do best… the ability to manipulate Ki."
Standing with arms akimbo, Hugo looked at him and said, "That's quite enough, mister conspiracy theorist. Knock it off."
Looking away, trying hard to not look bothered, Vincent added, "If they actually wanted, they could take our Ki manipulating abilities away for good."
"Yes. And if a dog wanted, it would sprout wings and fly like a fairy… get back to work!"
An awkward pause followed as the Zeta Squad stood still while Hugo and Vincent went back to searching through the debris. Soon, however, they too joined in.
A few minutes later, there was a knock on the front door. The squad looked around at each other.
"Guys," Marcus said. "Were we expecting anyone?"
"Not really," Hugo replied speaking slowly and in a hushed tone. He shook his head subtly. "This can't be good…"