JO HASEUL JANE

"She decided to free herself, dance into the wind, create a new language. And birds fluttered around her, writing "yes" in the sky." ― Monique Duval

• CONFIDENTIAL PROFILE

Attachment is like a personal prison humans create for themselves. It’s that spiky ball with iron chain restraining your ankle from moving. You must absuletely know when to let go, and never use a question of “Am I ready or not?” as an indicator, you will never be ready if you have to ask that question. That’s what I have been telling myself all throughout my life. That’s how I learn to be detached from everything outside my personal system. That’s how I have come to accept my parents’ death. No matter how hard. How difficult.

“Is that why you let go of Gianne?” Ash, my brother from Barebone family asked me once that night. There was a moment of pause, enough time for me to contemplate, enough time for me to pour hot hazelnut chocolate inside my cup, using it as an excuse to postpone my answer.

“I never let her go,” carefully, I lift my cup and created distance from the kitchen counter—from Ash who tried to make a midnight supper as I lean against the kitchen’s big window. We were on the second floor, I blow my cup and looked at pale full moon up in the sky. “She chose to go in a different path than me, and I can no longer walk beside her when we have clear difference now. I refuse to do thing in her way.”

“You are still letting her go, telling yourself you have no attacgment with her. But you save a soft spot for her.” I didn’t answer, instead, sipping my hot chocolate seemed better at that time. “Just be careful, Jo. There will be time when your relationship with her coing back at you, trying to hold you back. I hope you will be ready when the time comes.”

I knew that, I know. The only person who knows about my conflicted relationship with Gianne is Ash, and we both know it too well that this won’t be as simple as coworker becomes a stranger, or your lifetime friend for year into a mere old friend. She will be something worse than that. Something I can’t even bring myself to mention.

ΘΘΘ

What’s the worst thing that can be witnessed by a 4th grader kid, who barely reaches 10 years old? Everyone may have different answer, but for Joanelle, there is a tale she doesn’t really remember yet keep appearing in her nightmares. Almost every single night.

It was still the beginning of spring in Canada, Joanelle’s parents rushed to their daughter’s school after receiving an urgent phone call. Joan’s teacher said she caused a commotion almost everyday that distracted students from studying; random wind flipping park’s bench when a student was eating their lunch, sudden rain ruining art projects who were dried under the sun. It sounded almost impossible, why would her teached put a weather change above a kid’s shoulders? Miss Rowen didn’t even know what really happen, she was not in the scene to witness.
However, students kept pushing her to take an action. She decided Joan probably pulled some nasty pranks to her friends, pushing her friend from a bench and flip it before running away? Who knows. Pouring a bucket of water to her friends’ works? Miss Rowen never knows.

Little Joan looked so glum, she kicked little rocks in front of her school gates as she waited for her parents to pick her up. She didn’t understand what went through her in the last few months, this was not the first time, it had always happened since long time ago but recently it became so frequent she began to wonder. What was it really that flows inside her body beside red pure blood? What did she do that was so wrong in front of her friends? She understood it as best as she understood ballet, and she never joined ballet class.

Then there they were, a silver suv stopped in front of her standing spot. Joan straightened and pulled herself from leaning against the school gate, but everything afterwards happened too quickly. As soon as her parents came out, two loud bang sounds made little Joan yelp. Blood trickled from her parents temple. Joan was just about to run towards her mother as another loud noise attacked her ears. Another bullet passed through her parent’s chest, both of them laying down under their car unable to say any last word.

Little Jo cried, she wheezed, weeping as hard as she could. She knelt down and put both of her palms covering her ears. It’s buzzing with repeated bang! sounds and swinging bullets grazing the wind. Last expression of her mother—shocked and horrified face—before she took her last breath forcefully swirling inside her mind, as if it’s floating together with several question marks and anger, disgust, hate face her friends usually made at her. Joanelle cried harder.

ΘΘΘ

She woke up in a strange place, room with high white beds around her—where she just woke up from, in fact. There were two big silver capsules with access like an elevator’s door in the middle –placed at least 5 meters next to each other—with big tables containing tubes with blue, red, and purple liquids, tangled cables connected to several iron clips, and other tools Joan could hardly remember on either side of the capsules. She tried to sit, only to realize her legs were tied to the corner of bed’s legs.

“Hey, new kid.” A flat but visibly trying to be friendly voice greeted Joan, she turned her head and found another kid around 3 or 4 years older than her calmly playing deck cards despite having both of her hands and legs tied, she managed to sit down even. “Funny place, isn’t it?” Joan waited for the stranger kid to continue, as she watched her ‘roommate’ focus flipping cards and ocassionally laughed. “Choose a card. Beat me. I will tell you my name.”

Challenge her, beat you she will. That’s how Joan met Gianne, and no one would have guessed that it became a beginning of something so complicated that would fill Joanelle’s fate.

ΘΘΘ

8 years is an extremely long time when you became an experiment object. Telling you you were born to be a weapon and must be trained, telling you you will grow up into a great defender and fighter. Whose defender, exactly? SPECTRA SS is the name, a secret organization based in England short for special training for superhuman society, Joan laughed the first time she figured out their name. Gianne laughed five times harder. She was strange that way. But from the organization, Joan found out that she was not an ordinary human, she learnt what her bloodline was, descended from an ancient American witch who had a sorcerer power (including weather manipulation). Not to mention that her mother was a grandaughter of a well-known shaman in South Korea. She was not told exactly who killed her parents, however, the organization admitted they kidnapped her shortly after they found her crying in front of her parents’ corpses. They admitted they had been watching her to see her potential grew. Joan was raged with how they didn’t try to help her parents from being killed if they actually kept eyes on her, whenever Joan threw a tanthrum, she would be tied soon after. She never got answer regarding why must her parents die. Gianne, beside barely showing significant emotional support, was there for Joan. It was a tough process, missions after missions, punishments, rare rewards despite exceeding their expectation, survival challenges after challenges, class, training, practices. Joan and Gianne skyrocketed into two of the most highly skilled and trained trial kids in their organization.

After long years of struggling, absorbing any kind of knowledge and skills they could get, Joan and Gianne gradually thought of an escape plan. Right after they hit 8 years, Joan and Gianne succeeded in escaping the building after planning it thoroughly for nearly half and a year. Jo was nearly 18 years old at that time, managed to go as far as possible from the undercover buildings that were used for spectra ss organization. They spent weeks as homeless kids blending with the crowds trying to avoid possible agents from spectra ss to bring them back.

Until one day, they met one tall guy in huge creme coat telling them he was in a charity project (kind of a personal bucket list crazy rich billionaires do, that’s how Joan decided would suit the kind of guy like him) he wanted to adopt those who in need of help (Yeah? Sketchy as hell, that’s also what both Gianne and Joan thought). They refused. The guy left his name card in front of Joan which she later picked up. Their meeting was actually not exactly random, it all started when Gianne insisted she wanted to try shoplifting from one fashion retail, no one knew who they were for they are not actually from England, might as well doing crime and run away from it. Joan strongly refused, but she finally decided she would keep an eye on Gianne (and tried to use her skills to help them from getting into troubles without attracting much attention). It kinda succeeded, they didn’t attract any attention except from this one tall guy. He was in the shop and quickly followed them outside when they were done with their ‘business’. They talked in a small coffee shop before Gianne told him off.

Silently, Joan decided she need to use her enhanced perception and surveillance skill to do a quick background check on Mr. Barebone, the guy they just met, making sure he was in no way related with Spectra SS or any other organization like law person, for example. He was turn out to be a normal rich guy, living in his own mansion for he has no wife nor child. She found out he has been trying to adopt other kids other than her and Gianne, he seemed to be the most normal compared to his two siblings of Barebone who had their own family (Joan found out about this because one time, she followed him to one biggest mansion she has ever seen, and there, there were actually two other men who somehow looked like they were related to this guy she knew, they were strongly what you could tell as three rich sibling from one rich family). The other men had wifes and children, it seemed to Joan that he was the only one without family. It kind of made Joanelle pitied him. Few days after secretly following Mr. Barebone, Joan told Gianne her finding and expressed her plan to accept Barebone’s offer, it’s not like they had anywhere to go other than this. But Gianne insisted she would never be in any family (which slightly hurt Joanelle since she always considered Gianne as her only family in Spectra SS) but eventually, she accepted her reasoning. They could still arrange meeting after all.

That’s how Joanelle finally became part of the Barebone family. She still used her english name and barely used her Korean name, and although she disliked some of Spectra SS treatment to her, she decided to also attach middle name ‘Hilt’ which was given to her, something like an agent name for her. She is legally adopted into Barebone with her legal name, Joanelle Hilt Barebone.

Story to be continued and explored more in plots.