"Well! Major SA offices have regular meetings to discuss local and less-local happenings, association business, any community events, and similar things. They serve as a social hub to keep everyone connected in a way too. Practice areas built sturdily enough for magically enhanced physiques or outright magic attacks and manipulation, plus the presence of people with experience for advice and such. We serve as a clearing house for forming teams and locating and tracking dangerous monsters before they can threaten people, though of course not every spirit bearer fights monsters. We organize classes on magic use sometimes, even if a lot of it is intuitive they're supposed to be good, and on monster identification and tactics, nature spirit relations, and so on. We do have legal teams to advise and defend spirit bearers if they get into any legal trouble, and the liaisons for 'miscellaneous' assistance - there's a lot we do, too much to quickly list. The Spirit Association avoids taking public stances on things completely unrelated to magic or monsters, but we did announce an analyst's determination that it was not reasonable for that incident to be a case of mistaken identification unless the officer was impaired in some way. Also, you're right that I don't know much about Culpeper Cut, I can't even say where I've heard the name before."

"That's good, although perhaps too dry to actually sink in to the ongoing discourse, and furthermore reading as weasely in that...if that was the exact phrasing you used, you gave him an out, of sorts.  And you can't do that if you wish to actually condemn, though I may be projecting my own desires.  Regardless, 'No officer'," she winces, "'in their right mind,' ugh, 'should make that determination; it is an obvious error', is a lot different from 'If the officer in question believed such a thing was true, his faculties were impaired'."

"Culpeper Cut: A prairie spirit that's migrated over thisaways into some local ex-woods.  What information I gathered from both Spirit Association and outside sources described it as 'erratic'.  It's really not, it just has different priorities, and a mischievous streak strong enough to enkindle someone just to see y'all running around like headless chickens about it, as far as I'm given to understand.  It likes botany."

"Of course I personally didn't say that. These decisions are far above either of our heads - though I could certainly get you a meeting with someone up the chain. As for Culpeper Cut - oh, now I remember, he kept chasing off the girls we sent to talk to him so official classification is neutral, preferred non-contact. -Most spirits are indifferent about what gender to assign to them, if any, for what it's worth. If you've managed to open relationships with Culpeper Cut that's definitely something we should tell the librarians about."

"I hesitate to believe they'd listen to little ol' newly-fledged me up in the heights of the executive suite, or wherever national-scale PR releases are ultimately approved, but if you believe it would be worth their time to hear my thoughts, then I will at least write them a letter.

"Yes, let's talk to the librarians.  ...Why are they librarians and not psychologists, anyway, especially xenopsychologists, if their 'job' is managing spirit-whistling?"

"The Association hails from 1692, there are a lot of old traditions that a lot of our senior spirit bearers are very reluctant to let go of. The librarians are the informal name for the entire research and information branch. I can certainly get you a meeting, but maybe not right now. Aaand here's my office," she gestures at one of the doors they've been passing, "In which I can check and arrange that."

"A-ha.  That makes more sense."

"...So, would you like to do that, since we're here?  And I did mean what I said about doing a letter, if that'd work."

The office is a fairly spacious place. There are two chairs and a little couch opposite the desk. There are many pamphlets with titles like 'What Do The Elements Mean?' or 'The Sacred Spear'.

"A letter would definitely work, and work better if you're in our records! I'll just get started on seeing who's available, then."

And she pages through a rolodex, then places a call with her desk phone. There's a CRT monitor on her desk, but she's not using the computer for this apparently.

She'll page through the pamphlets; especially the spear one, as it relates to a few ideas she's had percolating recently, but she wants an overview of the elements as well.

Spears are, to steal a video game term, super effective against monsters! By all mundane reasoning, this should not be the case. It extends to polearms too. Is it a psychic gestalt effect, humanity's defenses raised against the dark? Is it an innate property of long pointy things and monsters? Nobody can tell for sure, but the fact remains that humans wielding spears against monsters, even completely untrained humans, have statistically much better chances than if they used any other kind of weapon - even guns don't help as much as you'd expect, compared to spears. This is why spear drill is mandatory in high school gym class, and why every household should have a spear for use in emergencies.

The basic elements are: Shadow, light, earth, water, fire, air, metal, and lightning. They're called basic because a great many - most, in fact - spirit bearers' magic tends to thematically center around one or more of these elements. They have typical associated colors and magic types and personality types, like healing for light or mobility for air or crafters and tinkerers for metal.

Does the Spear Effect extend to smaller, yet still proportionally long pointy things like crossbow bolts?

Arrows and crossbow bolts also exhibit spearlike properties, such as seeming to impair and damage monsters more than the actual wound itself should! If less strongly than actual full-size spears wielded with human hands.

Eventually her orienteer says, "Does 5 o'clock work to talk to a spirit relations person? That's an hour and a bit. I know it's a bit late, but I imagine you have school to go to tomorrow so it might be best to get it done now."

"I'm sure I can find plenty of things with which to occupy the intervening time, spell testing and personal development among them."

...The stripe on her outfit has, incidentally, switched colors again.

"Great! We do have some good practice areas I can show you. Uh, what name do you want to go by here? For the appointment and maybe some paperwork."

A long, slow, blink passes.

"I find myself wondering why you chose this particular moment to ask.  Realistically, it is because of the paperwork, and furthermore because there are indubitably several Lunaë wandering about these illustrious halls already.  Still, one must wonder at coincidence.  It is often not coincidental.

"Regardless, if it is the name most likely to be associated with a legal identity - in the longer term - rather than a persona, that you are now seeking...

"We shall need to file name-change paperwork about it, eventually, but.

"Annabel, spelled Annab-e-l, Asterisk, spelled as you would the punctuation-mark, Lee, L-e-e."

"I, um. Because I need to tell them who to expect for the appointment? Or - oh, you said, I think 'Luna' before. My apologies, I'm a bit scatterbrained today. I see you've got basic raiment manipulation down though, congratulations, by the way."

"Or something of the like, yes.  I am unsure if this is being accomplished by the normal method, as it was in fact done by application of a spell."

Hm.  That reaction is...a pity.  She was hoping that she had been recognized - and implicitly accepted.  But now, the others' woes and worries still yet lurk.  (Ophelia, herself, simply has no fucks to give about what others think.)

At least she was not met by transphobia.  That would have ended...poorly.

She nods and uses the computer to send a quick email. "There. Appointment all set. Want to talk about next steps paperwork wise, or see the facilities, or talk about your concerns with joining, or...? Oh by the way, at any time you can ask to talk to someone else - personality conflicts are a stupid problem." She gives a small smile at the in-joke.

She nods, and smiles slightly, before her face returns to serious-business mode.

"Paperwork; getting that out of the way seems important.

"As far as my concerns regarding joining, I have articulated the two that yet hold sway already, and you have done as best you can to resolve them.  I'm interested in the organizational structure of the Spirit Association out of academic curiosity, though."

"There's three big pieces of paperwork you'll probably want to get done regardless- Basic registration, which doesn't mean membership, just helps with recognition if you have to talk to po- emergency services or anything- Monster hunting license, so you can officially claim bounties for keeping the world clean, and payment information so we can actually pay out said bounties, or draw dues if you end up deciding to join officially."

"I am quite aware that I am going to have to interact with the police, and generally believe that someone needs to be trained to stop, pardon my language, assholes with guns; you needn't walk on tenterhooks around the subject.  I merely dislike their ubiquity in situations that merit no violent response, and the shoot-first mentality as observed so vividly in recent events - when it is not instead not being deployed when it ought to be, in defense of lives that some write off.  ...To borrow an analogy, they are at best an untrained man flailing about with a naked blade; it is their discipline that is most thoroughly lacking, and their fealty.  I actively appreciate the investigative function some serve, though admittedly a lot of that is on the federal level or, once again, applied in a prejudiced manner - if not both at once.  ...If the Senator from California's bill goes through, perhaps, the police might actually have a roughly accurate mandate compared to their...charitably, poorly honed skillset - especially if someone imposes upon them a duty to protect as they well should.

"That said, are there particular certifications I can or should pursue for fire and rescue?  I believe I could help with that, and furthermore that I should help with that.  And I will be pursuing enough medical education to be able to perform proper triage and first-line care as regards injuries I am likely to encounter in the field, I hope, but if there are specific courses for...

"Well, I have yet to find an occasion to test it, but I believe I am capable of healing, given appropriate targets.  ...The amount of 'elements' within my reach, with a bit of effort, is honestly rather impressive, given that I am given to understand most have one."

"...Excuse me, I have gotten quite sidetracked.  Basic registration, monster hunting license? - well, I suppose it must be registered somehow, but I'm quite surprised it's a license - though the model it's approached through is clear.  ...And payment information, for bounties and dues.  Well, shall we?"

"Alright." A talkative one, she is. "Spirit bearers can file for limited peacekeeping authority, by the way. Not to file charges but to detain temporarily, evacuate people, that sort of thing. I understand there are issues interacting with cops sometimes that helps with... Anyway, we also have fire and rescue classes we can arrange, yes. And I doubt you'd actually get in trouble without one, with magic, but yes, it's a monster hunting license that anyone can get if they really want but just difficult enough so untrained people don't risk themselves too badly or make things worse. There's a test."

She has assembled a few paper forms and pushes them across the desk.

"I didn't get in trouble without magic, either, as it happens, though there are many parts of me that would not want to boast about just stabbing a couple monsters with a spear."

She lets her pride in 'her' skills show, just a bit, with a subtle, friendly, smirk, then sets to filling out the paperwork.

"Nice! Yes, I imagine it's one of those laws that, ahem, isn't universally applied."

Paperwork wants to know all the usual stuff like gender, name, address, birth date, is she under 18 and if so parent or guardian information...