//File 0.1 - Clarice//

Janus wanna leave, she is not holding him back. On the contrary, as soon as Janus it out the door, she heads to her private room, where she locks her self in. Then she Astral projects in order to follow Janus, and perhaps see what got into the air spirit.

Clarice followed the signal of her spirit and withdrew herself into her astral aspect. Dematerialising into the astral plane of endless void and emptiness, her body shone with a radiant light. The air spirit next to her shone a clear blue, as it indicated the source of what caused it to declare a warning just a moment ago. The aura of Janus was seen to be departing from Clarice, as his physical form did. But what remained was a vile presence, an image of an astral being surrounded by what could only be described as some poison or toxin leeching out of its form and coalescing about it.

That followed your guest here. No wonder Clarice hadn't detected it earlier when she assensed. The toxic being only just managed to track Janus in order to find Clarice. The spirit then communicated that its service was over: it protected Clarice from any unpleasantness from Janus, but now that Janus had left and the toxic form no longer haunted Janus, the terms of its service had also ended.

The toxic form, which looked as if it had insectoid features, stood there in front of Clarice, but did not take any action.

Scheisse! Its the first time the Clarice has been face-to-face with the dreaded insect spirits. She has lots of theoretical knowledge, but no experience with them. 80% of her focus is set to withdraw the second the spirit seems to attack, with the remainder she asks Who are you, what do you want?

A small pang of sorrow, Clarice realizes that this was her the last day in Hong Kong. Someone had sent the ring to Shanto/Janus, filled his mind with longing, and let him do the legwork while this poison spirit followed him.

The astral form did not seem to want to attack, although it was evident that it was there to track Clarice down. An image appeared in front of her, of Shanto in his office at Mitsuhama Computer Technologies, before the image of Shanto itself turned into a human insect hybrid. This picture lingered in front of Clarice's psyche for a long time, and when it began to fade, the astral creature behind it had long gone already.

Clarice had no experience with insects, but knew someone who did, a runner named Helios Zen whom she had a chance to work with on occasion.

Clarice withdrew from the astral and back to her own body. She had two calls to make. One to Santo's office to confirm his whereabouts and one to Helios Zen, arranging a meeting.

Then she packed her things, handing in her resignation and settling her financial affairs (wages/bills ect). When she left the club, she would never come back.

The club manager was stunned at Clarice's sudden resignation. Was something the matter, he asked, was it the money, was there a difficult client, did someone else offer a better deal. Clarice had been an excellent employee who had never raised a fuss about anything, so the manager was surprised to hear her say she wanted to leave. Seeing no way to persuade her otherwise, he agreed to let her go. This meant that there was going to be a problem with finances.

Clarice made the first of her two calls, her commlink patching her through to MCT headquarters in Japan. She managed to get routed to Shanto's department, arcane research, before the automated voice at the other end asked, "May I know who's calling please?"

Dis is frauline Hönikin, from Saeder-Krupp, Neu-Essen, for herr Santo... Clarice imitates that bitch down in SF accounting, with a heavy german accent.

The voice on the other end apologised, "I'm afraid that Mr Santo is not in his office. May I take a message?"

Do you have his extension? I have a time-sensitive question for herr Santo. Clarice continues her schrade, but is pretty sure that "Janus" she just had a meeting with, was the real Santo under a spell or possessed.

She starts to compose a message for Helios Zen, asking for a meeting. She then takes a taxi to the drycleaners where some of her "gear" have been treated. Then home to collect her stuff.

The automated call reception rerouted the call to Santo's workstation computer.

Clarice was uneasy throughout her journey home and during the errands she was running. It seemed that she had to run away again, and still without discovering the truth behind why she was being pursued. She thought it might have been the Saeder-Krupp problem all over again, except that this time there seemed to be no link whatsoever to Germany. Instead, everything pointed to Japan. Perhaps there was never a Lofwyr problem in the first place, but something deeper.

All packed, she waited for Helios' reply and got ready to meet him.