Chapter Text
“As humans we are curious creatures. As the dominant species on Earth we take great pride in the thing that separates us from all other species on the planet. That thing in question being our intelligence.
We like to know things. Whether that be what something is, how it functions, or why it is the way that it is we love to learn everything there is to know about everything that is.
With that being said, an potentially even greater reason for this pursuit of knowledge is that our want to know things is vastly outweighed by our intense hatred and fear of not knowing things.
If you know what something is and what makes it tick then there isn’t a reason to fear it.
…This is also why many of us have a paralyzingly deep fear of what they do not know…
It is true that we have explored just about every inch of land on our planet, but are you aware of the fact that we have only thoroughly explored five percent of Earth’s oceans?
What about the fact that we are apparently only aware of five percent of our universe? In this context explored and aware are incredibly different words.
Of the parts of the universe we are aware of, how much do we actually really know about it? It’s a lot less than most people are comfortable with.
…That is where we come in…
Here at PSI (The Paranormal Society of Supernatural Investigations) our job is to learn everything there is to know about what we don’t.
If you have any questions your team leader will tell you anything you might want to know.
As they say, knowledge is power. I look forward to seeing you in the field, new recruits!”
The old CRT that the video tape was playing on suddenly cuts to black.
“...So…any questions?” A middle aged man with short salt and pepper hair, an unkempt stubble, and a tired look on his face says to the new recruits he was tasked with training. He looked like a disheveled detective with his brown coat and black slacks.
He was doing orientation for the two newest members of the organization, but it was obvious from his body language that he’d rather be doing just about anything else.
A girl with spiky red hair and a seemingly even more fiery attitude quickly raises her hand. She had a tomboyish look to her with her white crop top and long baggy black pants with flame patterns down each leg.
“Yes?”
“So when do I get to punch a ghost?” She says as she slams a fist into the palm of her other hand.
“Jacky! That isn’t the way you’re supposed to talk to your superiors!” A boy with spiky blue hair scolds his sister as he pushes his glasses back in place. Even though everything about the way he acted and spoke was proper, his leather jacket somewhat clashed with both his personality and his white button up undershirt, tie, and blue slacks.
“Shut it Will! It’s not like you’re my boss!” Jacky snaps back.
“Of course I’m not, but he is!” Will shouts.
“...They don’t pay me enough for this?” The reluctant mentor says as he pulls out a cigarette and attempts to light it.
“Detective Steven Stine!” The facility’s intercom suddenly responds. “This building is a no smoking area! If you must smoke please head to the designated area outside!”
“...Hmmm…” Steve grunts out as he reluctantly puts his cigarette away with an even more grumpy expression on his face.
Will suddenly raises his hand.
“...Yeah…What is it?” Steve says as he scratches the back of his head.
“How did your superiors know that you were going to smoke? There is no way that any normal person would have been able to obtain that information so quickly.”
“I thought that this should’ve gone without saying, but I don’t think that “normal person” applies to anyone that works here. Also, I can’t smoke in here because my bosses are all psychics.”
The intercom cuts Steve off yet again.
“You weren’t supposed to tell them that Steve.”
Steve sighs as he pinches the bridge of his nose.
“...Class dismissed…I need to go smoke…”
“...But you barely told us anything yet.” Will rebuts.
“...Eh…I’m more of a teach through experience type of guy. You’ll learn what you need to know while on the job.”
“Fuck yeah!” Jacky shouts out.
“Language!” Will snaps at his sister again.
“What? You know how much I hate school! Besides, I’m more of a visual learner anyways!” Jacky says with a shrug and a smug grin on her face.
Before Steve left to go on his smoke break he led the twins to a large break room area.
“Here are the other new recruits. Spend some time getting to know each other. This job goes a lot more smoothly if you can just at least halfway tolerate your coworkers.”
The twins approach their two other new teammates.
“Hi there! It’s nice to meet ya!” Greeted a girl with long curly orange hair that went halfway down her back. She was wearing a purple beanie, a large dark green coat, a black t-shirt that displayed the face of a generic alien, and cargo shorts. She was also carrying a large backpack that was covered in various small pins that featured aliens, ghosts, cryptids, a few anime and video game characters, and trans and pan pride flags. Actually, her beanie and coat were also covered in similar pins. She was wearing at least a few dozen of them.
“It’s nice to meet you too!” Jacky says as she wraps an arm around the girl's shoulders. “I’m Jacky and this nerd is my brother Will.”
Will shoots his sister a glare.
“...Oh…um…” A blush begins to appear over the girl’s freckle covered cheeks. “...I…I’m Rose…Wow you are a very forward person…”
“Yep! I get that a lot!” Jacky says with a smirk as she takes a step back and crosses her arms behind her head. “It seems like you are really into this paranormal stuff!”
“That would be an understatement! This paranormal stuff is basically my entire life! I could tell you just about anything you’d want to know when it comes to the supernatural…well…any information we are aware of at least. The mission statement of this organization might as well have been made to grab my attention personally…Oh look at me…rambling again…I should probably ask why you two were interested in joining the organization?”
“I want to punch a ghost!” Jacky immediately and passionately responds.
“Let me apologize for my sister.” Will says as he glares at her yet again. “The reason why we are here is a lot more serious than that.”
“There could be multiple reasons!” Jacky says as she interrupts her brother.
“As I was saying! The main reason why we are here is because our parents disappeared a couple of years ago. One day they were with us and the next they were gone without a trace. When we asked our neighbors, friends, and extended family they had no idea who we were talking about. If it wasn’t for me and my sister's memory of them it would almost be like they never even existed.”
“...Oh…I’m sorry to hear that…”
“Thank you. Since we weren't able to find out anything about what happened on our own we thought that our best chance to do so would be to join PSI.”
Rose glanced over at Jacky and noticed that she was trying to hold back tears.
“...Hey Jacky…are you alright?”
Jacky quickly wipes the tears out of her eyes like she was hiding the evidence of a crime scene and puts a big yet noticeably fake smile on her face.
“...Yeah…I’m fine! Anyway, we still have one more new teammate to meet!” She says as she starts quickly making her way towards the person who was sitting in the back corner of the breakroom away from everyone else.
“Hey!” Jacky says as she jumps onto the couch next to them. “Nice to meet ya! I’m Jacky!”
Even though they don’t say anything in response they are still noticeably scared. They had spiky long black hair that went all the way down their back. They were wearing a black a white scarf that covered their mouth, a long baggy black hoodie with the sleeves ripped off and a black and white striped long sleeve underneath, and white skinny jeans. The first thing Jacky noticed about them though is the fact that they had a third eye on the middle of their forehead.
Rose makes her way over to the couch.
“That’s Casey. They’re nice, but also really shy and aren’t that talkative around new people.”
“Do you two know each other?” Will asks as he makes his way over to the rest of the group.
“Kind of. We both first started working here about a week ago. Mr. Stine just told me some stuff about them when he was introducing the two of us to each other. I haven’t gotten them to talk to me yet either.”
Jacky scoots to the other side of the couch to give Casey more room.
“I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to startle you!” Jacky says apologetically.
They give Jacky a small wave in response which Jacky interpreted as her apology being accepted.
“Wait, how do you know that they can talk if you haven’t heard them talk?” Will asks. “For all we know they could be mute.”
“Oh! That’s because I asked them!” Rose responds.
Jacky turns her attention to Casey again.
“So, you can talk?”
Casey shakes their head yes.
“...but you just don’t want to?”
Casey shakes their head no.
“...Will you ever want to talk to us?”
Casey shrugs.
“Alright, good to know.”
The door suddenly opens as Steve enters the room.
“So Steve, back from your long awaited smoke break?” Jacky says with a smirk.
“You mean Mr. Stine?” Will corrects his sister.
“...No…just Steve is fine…” He says with a sigh. “You better have gotten to know each other, because we’re going to be heading out on our first mission in a few minutes.
“Let’s go!” Jacky exclaims.
“That was fast? I thought that we’d have a bit more training before we headed out onto our first mission?”
“Didn’t you hear me earlier? I said I’ll teach you while we’re on the job. There’s no better teacher than experience after all.”
“Let me guess. They higher ups just assigned a low level job and nobody else was here to take care of it?” Rose asks.
“...Yeah…That just about sums it up…” Steve says as he scratches at his beard.
“...Works for me! Let’s get going!”
Steve led the new recruits to a black van with the PSI logo on the side.
“I call shotgun!” Jacky said as she ran towards the car.
The team quickly got into the van and Steve started driving them towards their first job.
The location of which ended up being a huge old house that has severe fire damage.
