The Sipre Comes

Yesterday, Rome and Rei activated their prosthetic 24th chromosome that Estar had injected them with back when they were prisoners beneath the volcano Kilauea. MINIMCOM had re-activated them allowing our intrepid couple to enter the Ethereal World. Now that they are in it, they see things are not physically real but are psychically real. It won't take MASAL's Sipre, his Shadow, very long to find them:

     Rei turned to look at Reema and experienced the same apparition although her spirit blazed bright orange. He held out his free hand and saw a blue aura wavering around it, expanding with each heart beat. He was able to will his spirit to rise up, separate from his body and looked down at the others. Somehow he was able to process both sets of inputs at once. Strange was no longer an adequate word to describe the phenomenon.
     “Where are we?” he asked Rome using the new PPT channel, rather than the old, familiar, EM link.
     “This is the world of the Sipre,” Rome replied, somewhat preoccupied. She was surveying the ethereal landscape intently, looking for her parents. At last, she found her mother, off in the distance, dull and nearly lifeless. Only a small ember of her spirit remained. She could find her father nowhere. However, in physical proximity to her mother, at least in the ethereal world, sparked another flame that identified itself as Ursay. From her mother’s spirit, she was able the sense that her father was being transformed into a Zengei. This saddened Rome and she would have to deal with it but first things first.
     For now, she lifted her ethereal vision and could see swirling spirits of many different colors emerging. The spirits swooped and soared around her, thin and wispy. Way off in the distance, a green spirit blazed but it was indistinct.
     Rei saw them too. Through his earthly eyes, he could see human bodies coming toward them but most of their spirits were of a dark and dull color. Looming behind them was a much larger cloud, glinting, metallic, that drifted over the top and settled down in front of them. It congealed into the form of a black, hooded stranger. Rei used his earthly eyes and saw nothing. But in the ethereal world, more spirits were flocking in their direction making it crowded in a way that was indescribable. They could see no face within the folds of stranger’s robes but they both could feel the malice radiating from the entity.
     “Give me your child,” the stranger said to Rome.
     “Never,” Rome’s bright red spirit replied. “He is safe now and will be forever.” All around Rome’s flame, the tiny pink spark buzzed, almost as if it was trying to echo her words.
     “He is the child of a half-blood and this living abomination,” said the spirit, pointing at Rei’s blue glow. “He can only be saved by making him one of us.”

That tiny pink spark is Lupe, of course. And the Sipre is not going to take no for an answer. You can bet a battle will ensue.