Author's rant:

I take time to get into a story so the first few chapters are going to be a bit short, please bear with me. Unlike Miranda, I am not very good at writing extreme length chapters so sorry to disappoint those who look forward to those, I'll try to up the amount I write and also the level of my writing as best as I can.

Because this is still the start of my story, several facts are still uncertain so there were some corrections made to the previous chapter. These corrections are minor, mostly just my choice of words so don't worry about losing track of the plot.

Anyway, here is the new chapter.

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Chapter 2: The Black Fox

Moving through the crowded street, Thomas noticed the occasional odd stare that were directed at him. He silently congratulated himself on his work as he continued through the street. Since Nvara's visit, Thomas was finding quite a few people who were able to sense his lack of magic aura when he actually looked properly. In retrospect, he should have known there would be a few more exceptional people. In the days that followed his discovery, he had begun working on a cloak to project a magical aura in his place, now strapped around his shoulders. The conversations he overheard as he went about his usual shopping have informed him of the dangers for a squib walking around a magical area. Being a muggle, he was in even more danger. The prospect of being hunted as easy prey for local vampires was quite annoying, as far as Thomas was concerned.

Spinning down a side street to visit the Australian Gringotts, Sydney branch, Thomas noticed another keen observer, this one a goblin who Thomas had once bumped into, staring unashamed at him. Nearing the goblin, Thomas decided the short fellow could tell what projected the power, given the amount of attention that was directed at the cloak. Moving towards an empty booth, Thomas withdrew his vault key and presented it to his attendant. The old goblin, well, Thomas thought he was old, took his key without a word and ushered the two of them through several thick sets of doors. Having gotten used to the unmanned carts, Thomas slipped into his seat and closed his eyes.

With his eyes closed, the echo from the cart gave Thomas a clear picture of the layout of the bank. Thomas turned his head off to the left and heard the roar of one of the dragons which resided underground. The goblins would kill Thomas if they ever found out his knowledge of the bank interior from his abnormally perceptive abilities. The picture which had been established since his first trip into the underground tunnels were so detail, Thomas would have been able to find his way out faster than the goblins themselves, given the speed with which goblins could run. Knowing that they were near his vault, Thomas kept his eyes closed and waited until the cart stopped before opening his eyes. The heavily bolted door that held his money and items swung open with the turn of the key.

Darting inside and closing the door for some privacy, Thomas took out a length of rope and a bag of powder from under his cloak. Putting both ends of the 10 metre long rope together, he then proceeded to sprinkle dark red powder at the ends. Laying the loop flat on the floor, Thomas drew a dagger from his belt and prodded his finger, allowing a drop of blood to land on the red powder. All at once, colour shimmered into existence, showing a room full of items, most hidden under pieces of cloth.

Thomas released a sigh at the working portal. Gringotts was not an easy place to create a portal, and if it works in Gringotts, the portal would work at most other places. Dropping down through the portal, Thomas found himself lying flat on the floor. Another design flaw. The portal really needed to have a gravity inverter or some form of portal entry correction device. While Thomas strained his mind to form a logical device to incorporate into his design, his body began moving several of his priceless inventions next to the portal.

After 10 minutes of moving about, Thomas returned to the sizable pile of inventions he planned on leaving in the vault. Lifting one which clearly resembles a dart gun, he took a calculated leap through the portal, landing perfectly on the stone ground of his vault. Looking around the dull grey cell, Thomas picked the far corner to place the weapon. Moving back and forth, Thomas slowly moved all the items to suitable areas, weapons in the back left corner, potions in the right back corner, everything else shattered in seemingly messy heaps.

Giving a last look at the vault and the other side of the portal to check everything, Thomas then pulled the ends of the portal rope apart, the view of the room dissolving in an array of colours. Getting out of the vault and back into the cart, Thomas continued to work on solutions to his portal's flaw, dismissing most ideas as too space consuming and eventually arriving back at his initial idea, soaking the rope in a suitable potion.

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By four in the afternoon, Thomas had quite a lot of shopping bags hanging off each arm. The inconvenience of being unable to resize his shopping with a wave of magic had never really bothered the black hair teen, but sensing the stares he was receiving, Thomas really was beginning to feel annoyed. Deciding to dispose of his shopping with his portal, seeing as the alternative of taking off his cloak was getting less desirable the darker it became. Spotting an empty store, Thomas slipped in and opened his portal, dumping the shopping in quickly and closing the portal, all before the shop owner appeared behind the counter.

"Do you require a wand, boy?" Thomas laughed heartily as he heard that. Turning around to face the shopkeeper, he was shocked to see the shopkeeper undisturbed by his apparent outburst of laughter.

Thomas got his emotions under control and after considering the older man with greying hair, decided to grace him with an answer. "I can't do…"

"I can make wands with specific uses, young … squib." Thomas' eyes narrowed at the delay, noticing each wrinkle of the shop keeper's serious face, his dull grey eyes staring right back at him. Feeling threatened by the second most magically sensitive person he had ever met and wondering whether his cover may have been blown, Thomas reprimanded himself for becoming too arrogant and confident of his inventions, vowing to take more care from now on.

Suddenly realising what was said, Thomas forgot about the dangers of discovery and instead focused on the new opportunity. The ability to do magic set into a wand was very tempting, but he knew enough to understand the wand only worked as a channel, he himself would still need to provide the magic power. This was not what was slowing Thomas' response though, seeing as he had long found a way to "borrow" other people's powers. The potions he slipped into others' drinks had ensured he had a temporary tie, established between the drinkers and his magic borrowing orb. The ties lasted until the potions run their courses out of the bodies of the drinkers. No, what was taking up Thomas' thoughts was how he could learn the knowledge of creating wands with specific use. Calculating the different possible answers to whether he may learn of the owner's techniques, what struck Thomas as most problematic was if the production required magical power and magic channels. Deciding it was no use guessing at techniques he had not even the faintest idea about, Thomas asked as directly as possible. "Would it be possible for someone like me to make my own?"

The shop owner looked the teen up and down, his eyes occasionally pausing on the white clock still drabbed over Thomas' shoulders. "Hard to say, but I wouldn't say it was impossible."

Thomas saw the unspoken words that followed the response on the man's face, 'but you're not going to teach me how.' Having guessed at this answer, Thomas didn't even react, choosing instead to walk up to the counter and examined the single wand on display. The man's ability to make wands was reflected by the wand, the perfect smooth surface radiating the sweet scent of power. Thomas closed his eyes and felt the magic in the room gather around the wand, his half developed magical senses informing him the strong connection between the wand and its creator. No doubt the display wand was the shop owner's, with its ability to gather the stray magic in the shop where the old man's heart and soul was.

Snapping out of his trance at the slight cough from the man, Thomas gave his answer to the original question. "I don't think I need one thank you, I just wanted to have a look at your display." Giving a farewell nod to the owner, Thomas sighed at the missed opportunity to examine the specific wands, knowing if he failed to call up magic energy his cover of a squib would be blown completely, if the old man had not already known.

Stepping back into the now nearly deserted street, Thomas made his way back to the inn which wizards and witches used to enter the magical area. A flash of red light caught his attention. Thomas felt an area type spell pass by from the source of light and twisted his head about to determine the effect. Interestingly, everyone nearby who should had seen the light, still went about what they were doing, including a vampire who failed to notice his prey, Thomas, sneaking a glance at him.

Processing this information, Thomas putted on an extremely abnormal burst of speed, easily leaving his slow hunter behind. Completely forgetting his previous vow to be more careful with a slight smirk at the confused and shocked expression on the pale face of the vampire, Thomas bounced quickly towards the source of light. Given his reaction and the others' lack of reaction to the blinding light, the spell must have been one to redirect the attention of magical beings away from the source. Reaching the source of light about 1 kilometre away in 10 seconds, Thomas could only stare in awe.

Before him stood an extremely magnificent black fox with two swinging white-tipped tails, its half a metre long body simmering in the white fog emitted from its body. Spotting a few wizards and a witch with dazed expressions and nets scattered all around the area, it was obvious that the burst of magic was the fox's defence against these people.

The young fox sniffed the air, catching Thomas' scent. The teen relaxed his pose in response, giving the fox a clear view of his unarmed hands. Watching the fox examined him, Thomas caught sight of another wizard creeping behind the fox. As the other man raised his wand, Thomas immediately kicked at a stone lying on the floor, hitting the man in the head with pinpoint accuracy.

Thomas felt searing pain across his chest as his sudden movement spurred the fox into attacking him. The claws were most likely poisoned, his body heated in response to the invasion of foreign chemical. Struggling to pull out a vial of phoenix tears which he had bought a few days earlier, he suddenly felt the weight of a furry tail on his chest. Slowly he sensed the poison leave him, returning enough feeling to his fingers to pull out the vial, carefully dripping a drop of tear on his wound.

Putting the vial back in its rightful place, Thomas looked up from where he had been bowled over, coming face to face with the cub. The cub looked at him with silver eyes, its tails waving around in a hypnotic pattern. As the wet nose nudged Thomas in the chest, he returned the gesture and glided his hands across the silk smooth fur, marvelling at the creature's body. One of the tail, as long as the rest of the body, curled over and tapped Thomas in the face and he felt a connection established.

Thank You. Thomas swung his face left and right to locate the source of the sound, but nobody near were conscious. Knowing instinctively then who the voice had belonged to, Thomas replied back with his voice.

"You are welcome." Thomas thought the fox smiled, though it was hard to tell. Feeling particularly good about saving the little guy, Thomas got up and cheerfully waved good bye to it, only to find the fox following the teen. Suddenly not knowing what to do, Thomas kneeled down and caught its head, looking deeply to grasp its intention. Despite his ability to read human expression, Thomas was clueless when it came to a fox's. His confusion must have shown on his face because again, a tail flicked up to pat Thomas on the head.

What's wrong? This time, Thomas could tell it wasn't speech, but thought which he was hearing. Clearing his mind like he usually did in meditation, Thomas tried projecting his thoughts across the temporary link he felt.

Um, why are you following me?

Because you saved me.

You don't need to pay me back, go back to your family. An image of a caged black fox flashed across Thomas' mind, its meaning clear as day. The image was followed by others that had Thomas speechless in awe. The cub had escaped when he grew his second tail, power erupting from the growth breaking the magical lock that kept its prisoner. Thinking deeply to myths and legends that he had read, Thomas knew what he was seeing. The fox was a nine-tail fox, a creature of the Asian regions. It was most commonly known by its Japanese name, Kyuubi, because of manga and anime like Naruto.

Thomas shook his head, realising he still had to give an answer to the thought. Well, you can follow me if you want, but I don't know much about looking after you. I think you know by now but I am a muggle. Sensing the slight confusion, he added, a non-magical human.

What came back was a sense of happiness at acquiring a friend. The fox promptly leaped into Thomas' arms and licked his face.

Feeling happy about making a friend as well, Thomas surveyed the surrounding with the cub. The hunters, obviously the fox's captors, were mostly still standing there with dazed expressions, the exception being the one Thomas knocked out. Catching one of the swishing tail and bringing it to his face, he thought.

Can you undo the enchantment? The cub nodded uncertainly. The magic must had been accidental decided Thomas, the effect on the people in the main street was proof of that. Here in the empty resident area, the hunters obviously had an overdose of the notice-me-not magic.

Bringing forth the rope portal and sprinkling red powder at the ends, the teen held the rope up this time before dripping blood from his wound earlier at the ends. The fox sniffed curiously as the portal opened for the third time today. The room with all the scattered shopping came into focus.

Giving his new friend a mental command, the fox broke his spell as Thomas hopped in through the portal. The portal closed as Thomas, gripping one end of the rope, tugged the whole length through the portal. Letting out a sigh of relieve at the successful passing of multiple beings through his invention and the new closing technique of the portal, Thomas turned his mind on to other worries, mainly family and school.

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Well, that was quite a bit longer than the first chapter. I hope you guys enjoy this chapter. If readers don't mind, I would love to hear what you think of the story. I am trying hard to make Thomas not all powerful so please tell me if you think he may be too powerful. For the people who had read Miranda's stories, I plan to make his physical ability quite a bit better than most, if not all of the teachers, though he should still be quite weak since the teachers and students all have impressive magical abilities.

The Kyuubi had always been a pet/friend/familiar that I want Thomas to have because, well, take a guess why. (Tip: It has a large store of magical energy.) Anyway, it would be someone like Sygra from "A Second Chance at Life", though a whole lot younger and more child-like.

Look forward to the next chapter where Thomas would be finding the school.