Disclaimer: I do not own Magic The Gathering. I only own the characters and plot of this story.

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Bolas.

The man woke with a gasp, sitting up as quickly as he could. Sweat was making his black hair cling to his forehead, the salty water stinging his eyes as it dripped down his face. He felt as though he was being roasted alive and dipped in icy water at the same time, and yet as he looked at his grey clothes he was surprised to find them entirely intact. His loose shirt was drenched with what the young adult assumed was sweat while his trousers were muddied and worn. That, and his peasant-like sandals, threw him off. They were definitely his clothes, he knew that for a fact, but he also knew that they weren't. He tried to remember a time when he had worn something else, but found that he couldn't. Actually, he couldn't remember anything. It was at this point that he began to panic.

Why couldn't he remember anything? He dug deep for memories in his mind, searching frantically for anything that could tell him where he was. He found nothing, except a single word that held no meaning to him: "Bolas". He knew it must be important because it was the only word he could remember; maybe it was his name? No, that didn't sound right. The name didn't fit him, on a subconscious level, and yet it was the only thing he had. "So," he whispered, surprised at how raspy his voice was, "Bolas it is."

He got off of the hard dirt he was laying on, trying in vain to dust off his trousers, the dirt sticking to him like a magnet. Sighing, the newly dubbed Bolas looked at his surroundings, not recognizing any of it. He was in a dark, cramped alley surrounded by tall buildings, bustling crowds in drastically different colors on either end of the alley. Some of the people wore outfits entirely of blue, while others wore solid colors of red, green, white, and even occasionally black. Others had mixtures of those five colors such as blue and white or green and red. Bolas walked towards one of the crowds, becoming mesmerized the great display of color, though it made him look at his own clothing with a frown. He had seen no one else with clothing such as his; grey and cheap. Was he poor? The thought horrified and repulsed the man. That simply couldn't be. Something told him that he was no mere peasant, but the disdainful and pitying looks he was getting from the people dressed in color was telling him that he was.

Shaking his head of such thoughts, Bolas made his way into the moving crowd, following the flow while ignoring the hostile looks of the others and trying to look as though he belonged. He kept his head down and looked for anything that would look familiar along the street but found nothing. At one point he caught sight of a large castle on a hill overlooking the town where Bolas found himself, and he couldn't stop himself from nudging the person beside him.

The person, a smaller blonde woman in a complex white dress, looked at him with equal amounts pity and wariness. "Excuse me miss, but what is that place?" Bolas asked, pointing to the castle before he lost sight of it behind another tall building.

The woman gave him a strange look, before realization dawned on her face. "Oh, you're new to the city, aren't you?"

"Um, yes?" Bolas answered, not really sure if it was true or not.

"Oh, well then that's Lord Callist's castle. He's the patron of Brookridge, and rumor has it that he reports directly to King Kathan," the blonde supplied quickly, obviously not enjoying talking to Bolas. The young man, for his part, realized this and nodded his thanks to the woman before moving away from her. None of that had sounded familiar to the man, but at least he understood something about his surroundings now. He appeared to be in a city or town called Brookridge which was ruled by this Callist fellow. At least he knew the basics of this world he found himself in.

He continued walking until he realized he had been going in circles, having passed the same vendor at least five times. He knew it was the same vendor because the green-clad man kept sneering at him every time he walked by and hiding his merchandise behind a curtain. Honestly, he was getting rather annoyed at all of the looks he was getting from people, and all of the ones he wasn't getting from others. It seemed as though half the populace hated or pitied him, while the other half ignored him like they ignored the dirt beneath their feet, and if he hadn't had a talk with the girl in white he probably would've lashed out by now. As it was he wasn't willing to cause a scene just yet.

Then he heard a scream from very close by.

He pushed his way through the crowd towards the sound of the scream and, upon reaching its source, was shocked by what he was seeing. A man, dressed in tight clothes of red, was beating on a girl dressed similarly to Bolas in broad daylight. What shocked him even more than that, however, was how everyone else who had rushed to the scene was taking it. A few of them were shaking their heads in sadness or disgust, a few walked away like nothing was happening, and a few were even cheering for the big man. Not one of them moved to help the cowering girl as the man kicked and slapped her curled up form. Gritting his teeth in anger, Bolas watched until he couldn't take it anymore.

Breaking free of the crowd, Bolas whirled the man around, glaring into the man's brown eyes. "Just what the hell do you think you're doing?" he yelled at the red-clothed man, who was looking at him in a mixture of surprise- and rage.

"What is it with you Halfborns today?" the man yelled as he drove his fist into Bolas' stomach. Bolas, who hadn't been expecting that, doubled over in pain as he clutched his stomach. The other man didn't waste any time in striking him down, a meaty fist to his back driving him to the ground. Bolas felt rage flow through him even as the bigger man kicked him in his ribs. There was nothing right about this situation. He wasn't supposed to be the one being beaten, he wasn't some common beggar! How dare this brute even think of laying a hand on him!

He didn't remember when the other man had stopped beating him, or even standing up. All he knew was that the man was now looking at him in shock and confusion, and that his own vision was clouded with black. Wait. It wasn't clouded with black; something vaporous and black literally swirled around him like a vortex and Bolas was surprised to find that this didn't surprise him. This was right; this was how things were supposed to be. He felt powerful and found that he enjoyed the slightly fearful look on the other man's face.

"Shit, I didn't know you were a mage, man," the man said bashfully, face going red with what Bolas assumed was embarrassment. "Why the hell are you wearing Halfborn colors, anyway?"

Bolas ignored his question, partly because he felt was beneath him to answer the man, and partly because he had only a limited idea of what was going on. So he asked his own question instead. "Why are you beating this woman?"

The incredulous look increased on the man's face, as he looked at the entertained crowd that was watching the exchange. Many of the crowd wore the same confused face as the man in red. "Uh, well she, uh, stepped on my shoe and didn't apologize."

"That's all?"

"Um, yes?"

"Interesting," Bolas whispered calmly, though inside he seethed with rage. He wanted to make this man pay for such arrogance, finding an almost instinctual dislike for the man, his red clothes inciting anger in the younger man. As he wondered how he could hurt the man he heard a voice whisper in his head. He couldn't make out its words, but once it was done speaking a thought popped into his mind, one that made Bolas grin and his victim take a step back in trepidation. "Well then, if that's how things work here, I think I owe you for the beating you gave me."

The man, to his credit, figured out what Bolas meant rather quickly and began gathering red mana to himself to cast a spell. He just wasn't fast enough. Before he had gathered enough mana for even the simplest fire spell Bolas had already cast, screaming the name of his spell as though he had done it a million times before, "Adeptus Laminas!"

Then, where the man was standing just a moment before was emptiness that had engulfed the center of the fire mage. It sliced diagonally through the man, cutting out his chest while catching unnatural fire to the rest of his appendages. The man's now dead and bodiless extremities fell to the ground, the man's head set in an expression of shock and pain. The sight hushed the crowd's excited talking, and Bolas even heard a few of them throw up at the sight of the man. The sight didn't really bother him, and now that the rush of power he felt was fading he was a little scared at that. Something like this shouldn't be common, right? He had just killed a person so he should feel remorse, regret, something! Right?

Shaking his head, Bolas looked at the "Halfborn", as the fire mage had called her. She was still curled up in ball, sobbing into the ground even though he had just killed her attacker. Walking over to the girl he hesitantly put his hand on her shoulder, pulling it back when she flinched and started crying harder. "Um, excuse me, miss, but you're safe now. The man has been… He's gone now."

The girl lifted her head slowly, fearfully, her tearful blue eyes looking into Bolas' grey ones. "R-really?" she whimpered, and he gave her a nod and what he hoped was a reassuring smile. To his surprise, the dirt- and tear-stained girl threw herself at him, clutching onto him and sobbing into his shoulder. "H-hey, it's alright now, everything's going to be okay," Bolas patted her back awkwardly, not quite sure how to get the girl off of him. Turns out he didn't like crying girls. Either that or hugs. Hm.

Eventually the girl removed herself from his arms, suddenly becoming reserved. "Thank you for helping me," she whispered as she hid her blue eyes beneath her brown bangs.

"Ah, it's no problem, really," Bolas replied, scratching the back of his head sheepishly, "That guy was a douche anyway."

"How'd you get him to leave?"

"You, uh, don't really want to know. Just come with me for now, alright?" He was relieved when the girl nodded and stood up with him, Bolas carefully putting his arm around the girl's shoulder and leading her away from the fire mage's remains. The girl's been through enough, he mused to himself, and she shouldn't have to go through seeing that. The crowd from earlier had more or less dispersed, though people were still stopping occasionally to gawk at what was left of the corpse and the two apparent peasants walking away from it.

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An hour and a half later the duo had arrived at the girl's "house", as Bolas had no place to stay, and he didn't want to leave the girl alone just yet. After all, he had killed a person to save her, and so he felt a little responsible for her. It wouldn't do for her to go out and get in more trouble after he had saved her just because the people here were crazy. At first the girl had been against it, but he wouldn't be persuaded otherwise, so she had finally relented. They had left the city of Brookridge and gone to a secluded little area just outside of its bounds, the city and the castle both looming ominously in the distance. Bolas found out soon after arriving at the girl's home the Brookridge didn't look any better from far away than it did up close.

And that's what they were doing outside a shack that could just barely be called shelter. No wonder the girl hadn't wanted to bring him here; the place made Bolas feel claustrophobic and he wasn't even inside it yet. He looked at the girl who was looking at the ground shamefully and felt instinctively sad for her, though he knew she wouldn't want his pity. "So, why don't you live in the city?" he asked, breaking the tense silence and immediately regretted it as he saw the girl's face fall.

"I'm a Halfborn, so there aren't any inns or boarding houses that will take me," the girl whispered sadly as she continued to stare at the ground. He felt bad, but there was something that was bothering him, something that he figured was important.

"Hey, uh, what's a Halfborn?"

From the girl's reaction you'd think that he'd just turned into a pig and then sprouted wings. Her head whipped up so she could look at him, her mouth slightly open and her eyes wide with disbelief. "You-you don't know what a Halfborn is? How?"

Now it was Bolas' turn to be embarrassed, though he didn't know why he felt that way. "I, uh, I don't remember much. Nothing at all really. I woke up in an alley a couple of minutes before I found you and that's as far back as my memory goes."

"Oh," the girl replied, looking a little ashamed at her outburst. "Sorry, then. That must be hard." Bolas nodded, scrunching his face up as he thought about his condition. There was a name for it, he was sure, but like his memories it was escaping him. "In that case, Halfborns are rare people born without magic. Almost everyone has some form of magic they can use, and Halfborns are seen as freaks because we can't. So we aren't treated too well by the normal people."

Well, that explained why no one was helping her earlier. "Okay, but what's with the colors? Is that the kind of magic they can use?"

"Exactly," the girl nodded, "The colors a person wears tells what corner of magic they occupy. The m-man from earlier was a fire mage, so he wore red."

"Alright, makes sense, I guess. But why do people do that? What if they want to wear a different color one day?"

"They can't. Lord Callist has made it a law, under penalty of imprisonment."

"That's a stupid rule," Bolas snorted, crossing his arms, "Why the hell would he make a rule like that?"

"To single out the Halfborn," the girl whispered, simultaneously filling Bolas with rage and pity at the same time. What kind of ruler would do that to his subjects? One who has a death wish, a darker part of his mind thought, and he found that he couldn't help but agree. But he couldn't do anything about it. Not yet, anyway.

Deciding to change the subject, he decided to ask another question that had been bugging him. "Excuse me, but what's your name?"

The girl looked up at him sharply, looking rather confused. "What?"

Bolas coughed into his hand nervously. I should've started with that, dammit! "Well, uh, I kinda forgot to ask you your name earlier. It just now occurred to me. Sorry."

He stared at the ground in embarrassment, scratching the back of his head sheepishly, when he heard laughter. He looked up to find the girl hiding a small smile behind her dirty hand, and soon found himself smiling as well. It was a little funny, after all. "My name is Keira," she said, her smile evident in her voice, "What's yours?"

"I think it's Bolas," he told her, not expecting her happy mood to disappear as suddenly as it had come. "What? What's wrong with my name?"

Keira took a minute to answer, her blue eyes returning back to the ground. "That's the name of a great demon that King Kathan killed when he ascended the throne. It had terrorized the world for centuries before His Grace slew the monster. It was more powerful than any mage that had tried to stop it before; it was even rumored to be able to travel outside of our world to others, but most of that's just rumors. Anyway, King Kathan- hey, are you alright?" Bolas was not alright. As Keira had described the demon a headache had descended on the young man, especially when she talked of it roaming to other worlds. That had sounded so familiar, but from where?

"I'll be fine, I think," he managed to mutter, clutching his head as pain smashed through his brain. "I've just got a massive headache all of a sudden." Spots started to invade his vision and he was only half aware of Keira saying something to him. Suddenly he was on the ground, losing consciousness as he was only vaguely aware of Keira panicking over him, her blue eyes wide with worry. That was the last thing he saw before he left the world. Figuratively, of course.

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Spell Book

Adeptus Laminas=Doom Blade

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Welcome to my semi-first MTG story, hopefully the first you all will remember. *cough* Anyway, I got into this story through another story which was in turn partly inspired by victorbranoliver's The Eternal Dance of Light and Dark. It got me back into MTG fanfiction, so you can thank him for this story. I just hope it's even a fraction as good as his, because if it is then it means I'm doing something right.

For those of you with questions, leave a review, do NOT PM me. My inbox is full enough as it is. This chapter was meant to be jarring and a little confusing, so I'd love to hear the theories you all have about the human Bolas and the world he finds himself in. I hope you all enjoyed this chapter, and I hope even more to see you all next time.

Foxtrot Agent 21, signing off.