A knock on Ventus’ door wakes her as the sun shines gently through her window. Starting to wake, she sits up, feeling something wet down below. 

Fully waking up from this, she surges to her feet and looks back, a small area of silver/black substance staining her sheets. Quickly shifting her clothes around, she grins as she realizes what’s happening. 

Squealing happily, she grabs the supplies the doctor gave her as her tails wave wildly in glee. She manipulates her Hadajuban to be slightly thinner, but to also have panties, into which she slides a pad.

Her door clicks, and swings open as she is rubbing her belly happily. Looking up, she sees Lily with a concerned look on her face. 

“You okay Ventus? I heard the squeal.”

Ventus laughs, tails still stirring the air, “I haven’t been better in a long time. Sure there’s some cramping, but all in all, my first period is amazing so far.”

Blinking in confusion, Lily shuts Ventus’ door before asking, “You mean as an awoken right?”

Ventus chuckles before shaking her head, “No. I hope this doesn’t leave this room, but I used to only be a trans woman. After awakening, well no more trans addition to the word woman.”

Lily’s face pales as she stammers out, “O-oh. Are you okay with the change?”

Chuckling, Ventus nods, rubbing her stomach to try and ease the slight cramping. “Oh absolutely. I know some of us wouldn’t want the full change, i.e. keep their original reproductive organs, but I absolutely did want this change.”

Nodding slowly, Lily walks over before giving Ventus a loose hug. “That explains a lot. I’m sorry that it must have been hard, what with the leaders of this nation.”

Laughing, Ventus nods. “It was yes, but with me having been drafted due to awakening, and the fact I’m technically no longer trans, I don’t think I’ll have any problems. Changing topics however, did you finish the adjustments on the miko outfit?”

Shaking her head as she lets go of Ventus, she responds, “Not quite, I know what I need to do, but I don’t have the fabric right now. You’re a bit bigger than I was before I awoke, and there’s just not enough material to make the change and allow for more change when needed.”

Lily looks around, and sees the weird stain on Ventus’ bed. “Oh, what caused that stain? Also, we should probably get you ready for that press release. I brought a bunch of makeup, I want to make your face look a bit like a kitsune mask.”

Blinking in confusion before chuckling, Ventus nods. “Sure sure, I’m sure whatever you do will look good on me. As for the stain, well what’s going on with me right now silly?”

Lily flushes red as she starts to connect the dots. “So your blood is silver and black?”

Nodding, Ventus smiles, running a tail over Lily’s arm before using it to gently push her stomach so that she backs up. “Yeah, but we’re on a time crunch aren’t we?”

Chuckling, Lily steps back at Ventus’ gentle push. “Yes we should, but do you have proper protection, or know how to use it?”

Nodding as she eases herself into the nagajuben, she responds with a “Yes, one of the docs showed me. They thought I was 10 or something due to my bloodwork so they brought samples to demonstrate. Actually, I should probably see if they have the updated information from the sample they took soon after my blood changed. Then again, with the whole Senta situation I’ll probably need more drawn.”

Lily shrugs as she helps get the kimono onto Ventus before leading her to a chair and pulling out her supplies. “Probably, yeah. But we are on a schedule, so stay still. I’ll get started.”

Instead of nodding, Ventus simply makes a noise of confirmation and stays very still as Lily applies the rose eyeshadow and red lines around Ventus’ eyes while also painting a stylized third eye upon Ventus’ forehead.

“Go ahead and look. Ventus. You can see how you like it.”

Standing up, she carefully maneuvers around Lily’s supplies before arriving at the mirror. Gasping at what she sees, her tails wave wildly as her ears wiggle. “This is amazing Lily, I need to learn how to do this sort of thing. I look like a different person, an even more beautiful one, and that was a difficult bar since I’m pretty beautiful without makeup.”

Whispering to herself, Lily softly says “Yes you are. Too bad I don’t swing that way.”

Chuckling as her ears pick up the whisper, Ventus asks, “What about Todd? He needs someone, and he isn’t that bad looking.”

Lily shrugs before chuckling. “He’s actually nice on the eye, but I don’t really know much about him.”

Ventus chuckles as she opens her door. “Let’s go, and he’s actually very protective. He managed to save me from a beast when I ran out of mana, took a hit meant for me which damaged his ribs and lung from what I heard. Thank goodness mana seems to heal us quickly.”

Nodding, Lily follows along, leaving her kits in Ventus’ room. “I’ll be back to get my stuff later, but we are on a tight schedule with how long that took. We need to get to the crevice quickly, since that’s where the press release will be.”

Tilting her head before chuckling and wrapping a tail around Lily, Ventus says “Oh that’s simple, ready to go?”

Looking confused, Lily says “Sure, but how are we getting there?”

As soon as Lily says sure, Ventus wraps her mana around Lily and then travels along the threads, landing near the location of the press release. As she reappears, a number of awoken jump back in surprise, reaching for their weapons.

Lily squeaks in surprise at the sudden change in location. “What did you do. Wait, we're already here?”

Lamu shouts over the crowd of awoken, “Stand down, and welcome the kyuubi of space and time, Ventus.”

Chuckling, Ventus shrugs. “Sure, that does seem to be my ability set. More manipulating the fabric and flow of it, but that’s still space and time I suppose.”

Nearly all of the surrounding awoken drop their guard, putting their weapons away. But three foolish new awoken charge at Ventus anyway, yelling things like, “You’re a traitor,” and “How could you hurt so many of us.”

Ventus simply solidifies space in front of the three, causing them to knock themselves down, stunned, as they hit the “walls” face first.

“Just so you know, that’s what this is about. I’m to speak in front of all of you. I’ll explain my actions, and present what I know.”

Lamu chuckles before ordering the three that ignored his orders to be cuffed with mana suppressors. “You’re fools for ignoring orders. Now then. I’ll start the press release, but you need to be over here Ventus. You need to be in camera, preferably with all of your tails spread out so that they’re fully visible by the camera. Also, good touch Lily, her face really looks good now.”

Lily nods, a slight blush on her face from the praise.

Ventus teleports onto the stage, and lets her tails spread out, fully visible. Her mana shimmers faintly along them as they draw in the large amount of ambient mana, converting it into Ventus’ own. “Is everyone ready to start? It’s a bit chilly here, but not too uncomfortable.”

Sighing at Ventus’ statement, Lamu orders in an authoritative voice, “No talking until you’re asked to speak Ventus.”

Ventus shuts up, a grin on her face. Lamu then turns to the camera. “Brave citizens of the United states and the awoken across the world. We have recently prevented an attack from one of our own. They had managed to temporarily control the leaders of this great nation. We wouldn’t have known about it, nor been able to stop it without this brave awoken besides me. She is the one who discovered what was wrong, and took steps to fix it without a single casualty. If you don’t mind, won’t you say what tipped you off Ventus?”

Ventus grins weakly, heart pounding. She is  almost tempted to play a prank to calm herself before deciding to be serious. “The first signs I noticed were a few days before I even met Senta.  She had tested one of my locked abilities on Avery and it manipulated her. However her control wasn’t fully correct, and it bound the attraction and manipulation that the ability triggered to be focused on me.”

“The next thing I noticed was when I first met Senta. I had a bad feeling about her, and told her to not touch my tails. She then tried to attack me by grabbing a hair of  mine from her pocket. It didn’t work so she tried something else, ordering me to step forward as the hair turned to ash. I had stumbled forward before I destroyed whatever the influence was, and teleported away. Several squads of awoken came after me, some looking drugged, while the others were under the president’s orders.”

Taking a pause to catch her breath, power flowing into her tails and then back out. Ventus continues, “I went to see Lamu, and then found him being captured by some martial artists, apparently under orders from higher up. Upon rescuing him by knocking the men out, we discovered it was the President that ordered his and my capture. I then went around, knocked all of the affected and commanded awoken out before heading to the lab, where I fought more awoken. I then found Senta and after a scuffle, captured her with a mana blocking thing. That seemed to dull her control.”

Bowing slightly, Ventus then gestures to Lamu, “It’s back to you sir.”

Chuckling, Lamu nods. “A bit more than what tipped you off, but good for everyone to know. As for what we are doing about it, every awoken affected is under quarantine. They are rapidly recovering, so it seems that a source of mana from the caster was necessary. It seems as though for most it will only last a few more days due to the short time they were all affected.”

An awoken from the crowd, one of the three captured, yells, “What does that mean for the injured from the fox’s rampage?”

Lamu sighs, “I’ll answer the rude interruption, but please no more until I’m finished, there will be a time for questions.  For those that were injured, they received immediate care, and they all  have made a full physical recovery. Mentally, those that were compelled are in quarantine now that their injuries are treated, at least until we are certain that it is gone.”

“Now, let’s get to what I was about to say before the interruption. Ventus will be joining the main crevice exploration squad as both support and a front liner. We don’t have a proper award for awoken, but if we did she would have earned a medal for her service, both for ending the conflict without death, and for taking action when she could have deserted.”

A light silver blush blooms on Ventus’ face, and her heart beats harder in her chest. Taking a deep breath, she gets out, “It was my pleasure to help my fellow people,” before bowing, hiding her face that is rapidly turning silver.

Lamu chuckles and pats Ventus’ shoulder before standing her back up. “The last thing we have to say is that Senta will be executed. Not because of her ability, but because of how she used it. Under her own confession she could use other abilities, but none of the others she had access to were non combat abilities. She deliberately controlled others, and used them as her pawns, rather than using her ability to save people.”

Several gasps are heard throughout the crowd, but most are nodding in agreement due to how terrible Senta’s crimes were. “It is now time for questions, does anyone have any?”

One of the reporters step up, “How do you know she controlled the President sir?”

Lamu sighs, before admitting, “I had sent her there to relay information, unaware of what her ability could do. She was one of the better researchers we had, which is why I had sent her.”

The same researcher asks, “Why did you send her rather than calling? It would have prevented a large portion of this mess.”

Sighing, Lamu shakes his head once more. “No, it wouldn’t have worked. We received notice that our secure channels are no longer secure. Seeing as the matter was important to the nation, I sent someone who could explain it. As for what the information was, that is classified.”

After fielding a few more questions, the press release ends

Ventus sits on the stage, tails splayed behind her as her heart is thudding in her chest. “Okay, still not good at public speaking, but not the overwhelming feeling of wrongness it used to be. Could probably be trained to get through.

Chuckling, Lamu sits right next to Ventus. “You did good, and I’m sure people around the nation are going to want to look like you.. I was serious about wanting to offer you a medal though. Sadly the higher ups are still recovering from that control, and thus didn’t approve.”

Shrugging because she doesn’t really care about a medal, she asks Lamu, “Are we done here, or do we have more to do?”

Laughing, Lamu points towards the lab. “You’re to finally report there, Avery’s recovered, and she has some concerns over the last blood sample.”