Chapter Text
Satya was used to Jack and Gabriel’s disagreements, but she wasn’t used to being the cause of one. That was more Genji’s realm. Now she was stuck watching them go back and forth like a game of word tennis. She had already covered her ears and started humming softly to herself. Their arguments were so loud. All she did was request to take the mission solo.
“And what if she ends up with her mind wiped like the others, huh, Gabriel?” retorted Jack, his eyes wide and head cocked to the side, waiting for his husband’s response. “You want some other possible magic user out there messing with one of our agents? We’re already spread thin enough as it is.”
“Satya can take care of herself, Jack,” Gabriel grumbled in frustration, gesturing in Satya’s direction. Satya always liked how Gabriel talked with his hands. “She’s the best one for the mission and we can’t risk putting this off until next year. There could be a goddamn cult running around that town for all we know.” His eyes watched Jack nervously pace across their office space.
Jack turned to Gabriel and clenched his fist. He hissed through gritted teeth, “She still shouldn’t go in there without some kind of backup! What if it turns out that it’s the fae taking people and erasing their memories? You want her to take down fae all by herself?”
“She’ll be fine!” yelled Gabriel. “You let Genji fuck off to who knows where all the time. Where’s the issue with Satya?”
Okay, this was taking too long.
Deep breaths, Satya.
Breathe in. Breathe out.
Breathe in. Breathe out.
She uncovered her ears and placed her hands in the lap and crossed her legs. She straightened her posture and shot her boss a stern look. “John Morrison, with all due respect, I did not receive the title of Summoner because I am weak.” Satya stated simply. “I believe I have more than proven myself capable of handling fast-paced, high-stress missions on my own. If requesting to go on a solo mission is going to result in this much conflict among higher management, then perhaps my skills may be put to better use elsewhere.”
The room fell silent as Gabriel gave his husband his signature smirk and shrug. “What did I tell ya, sunshine?” he said.
Jack ignored him and met her stern look with his own stoic gaze, his forehead wrinkled in thought. Satya could practically hear the gears turning. Slowly, purposefully, he said, “Fine. You’re right. You can go alone. But.”
Gabriel groaned. “Jack, no.” Satya rolled her eyes. Here it comes.
“But?” they both asked.
“But. Hanzo will meet up with you in a week to provide backup if the mission still hasn’t been completed,” Jack finished. “Understood?”
Satya nodded. “Understood.” No use in arguing this point even further.
“Good. Now get out of here before I change my mind.” Jack ran a hand through his thinning, gray hair, clearly not pleased with the outcome. “You fly out first thing in the morning. Get yourself a rental and leave the other travel plans to us. We’ll send you the mission brief as soon as you head out. Dismissed.”
In a little over 24 hours, Satya was driving to the town of Plainsview, Ohio, a quiet, rural community that was experiencing a steady boom in population and commerce after a newly constructed highway connected it to the nearest major metropolitan area. Travel guides described the town as friendly and a great place to settle down and have a family. What those guides fail to mention are the disappearances. For almost a hundred years, someone, usually a nonresident, would vanish on the night of the harvest moon only to pop up miles away with no memory of what happened.
The current explanation was that it was tourists having too much to drink at the town’s yearly festival. Of course, Satya could think of a thousand other reasons this was happening. None of them were theories a normal human would have to explain the missing time: possessions, a poltergeist, angry wisps.
Satya spent her time the previous night and the entirety of the plane ride combing through every source of information she could find on the town. Local history, ecological reports, the local 411/town gossip Facebook page, everything. Her bosses had already ruled out any human explanation. It was the whole reason their team decided to step in. Victims ranged too widely in gender, body type, hair color, race, and place of origin. Humans were predictable. The paranormal, however, is not. That’s what irked her the most about it; the chaos of it all went completely against her sense of order.
The endless scenery was broken by a large wooden sign on the side of the road, the white paint worn and chipped. What used to be elegant hand lettering was now barely visible.
Now Entering Plainsview
Population: 1,479
“Home of the Watchful Scarecrow”
Ah yes, the scarecrow. Everyone back in LA was in agreement that Satya should start there. In her line of work, local legends and cryptids almost always had a twinge of truth to them. Sure, the locals would greatly exaggerate or flat out make up certain details of the true story. If the scarecrow was anything like she’s dealt with before, it was her best bet to finish her mission in record time.
After hours on the road, Satya arrived at the only hotel in town. Well, it was less of a hotel and more of a bed and breakfast, but it was the closest lodging Jack could book at the last minute for miles. It was a large colonial style home painting a crisp white. The historical marker just outside was indicative of its age. Satya walked up the main steps and opened the door to the smell of cinnamon and pumpkin. The main entrance had been converted into a small lobby. Behind the front desk was an elderly woman.
“Well afternoon to you, ma’am,” she greeted. She looked down at her notebook. “You must be, uhm, Ms. Vashvany?”
Satya tried her best not to cringe. “Ms. Vaswani, yes. I booked a room.”
“Are you here for the Harvest Festival, dear? You took the last room just in time.” the woman asked as she searched for Satya’s room key. “We’ve been getting a lot more tourists here since the town’s been growing. I’ll tell you what it's a lot more exciting to go nowadays than back when I was a spry little thing like you.”
Satya knew it rude to interrupt even if she didn’t want to listen to the other woman ramble on about change and “kids these days.” The woman unlocked her door and it creaked open to reveal a small room with a twin sized bed, dresser and television.
“We serve breakfast at 8 AM and please no loud noises. This is a reputable establishment,” the old woman said. “Not that a beautiful woman like you looks to be any trouble.” She winked and pat Satya on the shoulder who did her best not to shy away from the sudden touch.
“Rest assured, ma’am, it will be like I’m not even here,” replied Satya. She took her key from the woman and thanked her for the hospitality. After locking the door behind her, Satya inspected the room more closely. She ran a finger across the dresser and felt only a minimal amount of dust between her fingers. The linens looked fresh, pressed, and clean. She gently touched the sheets. The fabric was scratchy against her fingertips and she recoiled at the texture. She shook her hand to get the feeling of the linens off of her.
Satya, however, was always prepared for situations like this. She pulled out the neatly folded set from her luggage and rubbed her hand against the sheets. She smiled as she rubbed small circular patterns against the smooth fabric. She reveled in the tingle that they left on her fingers. She quickly replaced the other sheets and splayed across the bed, spreading her long limbs out to feel more of the fabric.
Now that she was properly settled, Satya pulled up her tablet where she made a color-coded sheet that listed all of the disappearances. According to police reports, the disappearances started sometime after World War II and they all followed a pattern. Every year, the town hosts their festival on the Harvest Moon. The next day, someone would come up missing. It was always an adult. Youngest was 21 and the oldest was 48. Some were married with children while a majority were single. Police would search surrounding fields and forests only to turn up with nothing. Several days up to a week would pass and the person would be found wandering around another town or ambling down a country road with no memory of what happened to them prior to their disappearance.
She put down her notes and stretched again. She always forgot how much travel tired her out. Daylight savings wasn’t much help either as the sun was already beginning to set. She ran her hands down her face, her eyes straining from staring at an endless stretch of road to now staring at her screen. The responsible thing to do was to rest, but instead Satya pulled out a book on the town’s local history. She turned the book to a page that was covered in notations. Her neat handwriting filled the margins of the page that described the Plainsview Scarecrow. Normally, she was against writing in books, but she had a job to do. She skimmed over the laughably small section dedicated to the scarecrow.
There are conflicting stories as to why the town adopted the image of a scarecrow as their town mascot. While other small towns might have a fun anecdote about a hippo that escaped the circus that came to town or a mythical panther stalking the woods, Plainsview has the Watchful Scarecrow.
Local legend states that a small cult was founded during the settlement of Plainsview. This cult worshiped a harvest god that took the form of a scarecrow. While many of their God-fearing neighbors denied the existence of deity worship in their town, other communities noticed that their crops were always plentiful and never seemed to be affected by any of the area’s harsh winters.
Members of this cult erected a scarecrow in a cornfield at the edge of town where they would bring a part of their harvest as an offering. This effigy stood until the end of World War II where the field in which it was placed burned down in a rare case of arson for the small town. Although cult worship was no longer practiced, another scarecrow was placed in the field as a sign of the town’s history and identity. However, no one knows for sure who put it there.
Today, Plainsview is still known as an agricultural community with a small school district, general store, and a bustling craft market scene. Every year during the harvest season, the town hosts an annual festival where The Plainsview Scarecrow stars in plays, hayrides, and haunted houses.
Satya sighed and closed the book. She’s reread that passage hundreds of times to the point where she basically memorized it. She should’ve known that the only reputable source of information of the town would only dedicate a small chunk of the story to a silly local legend.
And she was not going through those awful paranormal forums again.
She yawned and checked her phone. 7:50 PM. She was only two hours ahead of LA but the rush of her trip exhausted her. If she was going to solve this in record time, there was no use in spending time doing more research when she should be resting.
Satya took a quick shower where afterwards she drew snowflakes on the surface of the bathroom’s fogged up antique mirror and began to carefully line up her toiletries: face wash, toner, essence, serum, moisturizer, toothpaste, toothbrush…Where was her toothbrush?
Uh oh.
Satya loved her electric toothbrush. It was the only kind where the bristles didn’t send shivers down her spine every time she used it. The vibration sound wasn’t too loud and all the while it still left her teeth clean. She tore through her suitcase, her backpack, the bedding, the entire room and nothing. Her toothbrush was nowhere to be found. Satya whined. She must have forgotten it in the short time she was given to pack her bags for the trip. She could skip brushing her teeth just this one night, but after the plane ride and the long drive, now was not a good time to stray more from her routine than she already had.
She could just conjure one, she thought. With a wave of her hand, blue light shot out from her fingertips and formed the shape of a toothbrush. The fractal light then became a solid toothbrush. Satya touched the bristles and shuddered. Absolutely not. Time to execute Plan B.
Satya stared at the sad selection of regular toothbrushes in front of her. She already figured that Plainsview’s only drug store wasn’t going to have the specific toothbrush she needed, but she managed to find a brand she recognized as being safe. She went to grab one when she felt a presence behind her.
“You shouldn’t be here,” said a gruff voice.
Satya turned to see a large man standing behind her. He was over six feet tall with white hair tied into a small ponytail. His face matched his foreboding figure. He had a large scar that covered the right side of his face, staining his dark skin with a light pink. He had a prominent nose that was crooked, probably from one too many fights.
Then there were the tusks.
Satya knew casual glamour magic when she saw it. Many magical creatures that can easily pass as humans save for some key features. She also knew it was rude to point it out.
The man shifted, his posture straightening to reveal he was even taller, easily surpassing seven feet. She could feel his eyes travel up and down her body. Genji would probably say that he was checking her out, but this was something different.
He sniffed the air and sneered. “Yeah, you definitely shouldn’t be here,” he said again.
Satya’s mind raced to extrapolate what this man was trying to tell her. She didn’t belong in the store? Or did he mean in town? Maybe he meant in town. Did he sense her magic?
“Uh, yes,” said Satya. “I’m not from here. You see, I actually came in to enjoy the Harvest Festival. I just forgot some necessities.” She waved her toothbrush at him.
The man leaned down, his face way too close for Satya’s comfort and he huffed again with more emphasis, “Yeah, nah. You shouldn’t be here.”
Oh. So, this is how it was going to be. “As I said,” Satya said through gritted teeth, pushing her body into his space. “I am a tourist here for the festival. I understand you country types are insular communities who are wary of strangers, but I am not so unruly as to visit a stranger’s home and cause trouble.” She huffed and walked around the man, nose turned up. “Rude,” she grumbled.
Satya paid for her item and headed back to the hotel as fast as she could. She was tired and overstimulated. The universe was slightly in her favor as the toothbrush wasn’t a sensory nightmare or else, she probably would’ve had a meltdown. With that finally out of the way, Satya hopped into bed and fell almost immediately into a dreamless sleep.
Mako watched as the fancy lady sauntered off in the direction of the register. He sighed and shook his head in disappointment. He tried to warn her. He may be just a reclusive farming witch but he wasn’t stupid. That woman was practically oozing with magic, the air rank with its smell. That city slicker summoner was going to be trouble for everyone if those village idiots decided to make their move on her.
He turned his attention back to the small selection of toiletries and grabbed an armful of aerosol deodorant. Summer had been especially brutal this year and his friend was going to wake up smelling worse than his barn after a rainy day.
“Here’s hoping those drongos don’t pick her. I don't think Jamison could handle a woman of her class.”