Hello there readers of the world! I hope you've been enjoying this story so far, and I would once again like to ask you to leave a review if you like, dislike, or want to suggest something for the story. Heck, if you wanted to you could give me a character to use and I'll try my best to do them justice. By the way, thank you to Shamwoo52, even if you are a guest, you're criticism was great and has given me an idea of what to add to this story and has given me a better idea about how you feel about the story. Sorry I couldn't add this to the last chapter but I had written most of it, had school, and then just added the last part of the chapter. By the way, if anyone is willing to beta read this then please tell me, because I have a habit of not checking my work (sorry).
Also a final thing, I just want to make clear I do NOT have a general story outlined. Past a few things introduced in this chapter, I have no idea what to do, so if you want then in your review you can give an idea of what you want to happen and I'll see if I can get it done. While this will annoy you, I don't want my character to become a hunter or rogue vigilante or something like that (police/private detective is fine if you want). This is because I don't really want my character to be any kind of OP fighter (you'll find out why later) who can take on hordes of enemies. Hey, he could be a janitor if you wanted him to be. That doesn't mean I'll definitely do it though, but chances are I'll try. Anyway, to the story!
I slept about as well as you would expect for someone with nothing but a bag to rest my head on. It was cold outside and the wind felt like it was blowing stronger through the alleyway I was in. I woke up groggily with a pain in my neck and aches dotting my back in some of the most random places. Getting up I stretched myself out before everything that had happened the previous day came back to me. A couple (rivers of) tears came down my face but I wiped them away quickly. I needed to think of something to do not only take my mind off of everything, but also to come up with a way to find Jane and convince her that humans aren't all bad.
I walked out of the street with my sports bag and trusty spear, not that I was ever going to use it. Just because I had a weapon and the power to use it (not that it was a heavy spear) doesn't give me the right to use it. I am getting way too philosophical about this. I need to find food to eat, then a job to get more food to eat. I could pass for 18 if I need to, and I have some average general skills. I hope that will be enough for something decent. I walked through the city, looking for anywhere with a potential job application. I thought my luck was getting better when I saw a sign saying "Help wanted" Time for my time to shine.
I came back out a couple minutes later. The guy had an issue with Faunus and thought I was one, and I don't want to work with a racist, so I left. There was a fair bit of shouting if you're interested, and he threatened to send his son – a hunter in training at signal – at me, but I'd rather not describe it. Life in this strange place just really wasn't great and I was getting the worst end of the multiple sticks being thrown at me (you know, the pointy end).
I walked down the street, hoping things would turn around. I felt like I was dying of hunger, which was the first sign that I probably was and needed food soon. I came across a market place in one of the more lively parts of the city. People were bustling about, constantly trying to get the lowest price on their respective shopping lists. The owners of various stalls were practically shoving their various wares in the faces of potential customers, shouting about their own various deals or how "It is the best dust you can buy!" Did people really buy dust? Nah, dust has to mean something different here; the streets weren't always the cleanest. Besides, I could see a couple signs on the stall selling it. Ice dust? What about that dust makes it icy? The color? And what is gravity dust? That sounds either dangerous, or hugely underwhelming. I walked through, being drawn by the various sights and smell made by the food. I guess at the time I was going on autopilot at the time, but I had to switch back to manual drive to get past the perfume stands (and they said the garbage tips were awful. Dear god, I wished I was nose-blind), before I saw a fruit stand nearer the end of the market. I drifted closer, my mouth watering at the thought of fresh food. I drifted closer and closer, the owner still not noticing me. Once I was close enough I was looking through everything that was being sold. Apples, oranges, pears (ugh), vegetables (completely skipped past those) and every other fruit I could think of.
"Get away from here, Faunus scumbag!"
I looked up to see the owner of the stall glaring down at me. Does everyone think I'm a Faunus? What's up with that? I looked back at the food hungrily before I realized the owner was still glaring at me. Deciding to try my luck before I went, I asked what I thought was actually a reasonable question.
"Is there any chance I could get a job and work for you?"
The woman stared at me incredulously. I was getting the feeling that I'd gone back to 1900's America, except I was a white guy with an incredibly heavy tan.
"Does it look like I want some thieving White Fang member stealing from my business? Get out of here!" And with that, the owner pushed me away, making me fall onto my back. Brushing myself off, I stood up glaring at her angrily before I walked away. Is every human I meet here a racist? I almost agree with Jane's point of view. But there must be a human out there (other than me) who doesn't hate Faunus. I skulked away before pulling an apple out of my pocket. When the stall owner pushed me over I was able to snag one and hid it in my pocket when I landed. I didn't exactly feel bad for stealing from people like her. I was starving and she was a racist with food. It wasn't exactly much of a choice.
I walked away, munching on my newly acquired apple. Now that I had already stolen one piece of fruit, I was more willing to take another, which seriously reminded me of how some super villains started out. But hey, like I could become that successful uh, I mean evil. I was walking further away from the market when I felt a hand on my shoulder. Did she notice? If she did, then I am so screwed. I turned behind me and deciding there was no point hiding it, I kept on chewing the apple. What I saw behind me confused me, as it definitely wasn't what I was expecting.
It was a Faunus. He was roughly 5 feet tall, and had a mop of black hair covering his head. His eyes were a deep red and seemed to be searching for something in mine, which I found a little creepy. Maybe he noticed something about my eyes was wrong? I mean, it's not like they were always blue, but anyway I'm getting off track. He was wearing a brown leather jacket with a lighter brown shirt underneath. His jeans were a slightly dark blue and his trainers were an even darker blue. Talk about color coordinated. All of his clothes were ripped in random places, with a particularly long one on his right leg but thankfully I couldn't see a wound underneath. The thing that caught my eye the most however, was what made him clearly a Faunus. He was covered in scales, snake scales to be precise (which are different to fish scales) and it actually freaked me out a little at first. I could feel his hand roughly holding onto my shoulder while I carried on munching on my apple. I briefly wondered if I should bring out my trusty wooden spear, but there was no way I could bring it out in time, and I doubted (hoped) that he wanted to beat me up or anything.
"Did you steal that apple?"
"I prefer to think of it as permanent borrowing without permission." Ah, scared and overworked brain, you never fail to spout out nonsense on me, even when I desperately want you to. I was pleasantly surprised however when his face broke out into a wide grin.
"I like the way you think." Still grinning, he reached his hand out towards me in greeting. "The name's Cyan Fulvous, pleasure to meet you." Shrugging, I shook his hand. Clearly he didn't care that I was now a thief, so he couldn't have been too bad. Or maybe that was because he was too bad. Either way, in my hunger I'd already finished the apple so he would have no proof I'd done anything. That is a worrying train of thought.
"My name's Jack Jameson, member of the high society of the lost universal homeless people. A pleasure to make your acquaintance." Humor, you never fail to let me down with the bitter truth. Now all I needed was an actual society. Still I was glad that, unlike the last guy I told a joke to, he actually seemed to appreciate the joke.
"I'm guessing that was your first time stealing?"
"Not if you include that time I stole your girl." His grin grew even wider at that.
"I never even had a girlfriend."
"That's because I'm that good." This time he actually laughed, which made me laugh along with him. I could already tell that we would become good friends. He calmed down soon, but the grin was still there, so I counted that as a good sign.
"You're homeless aren't you?" Well that came out of nowhere.
I sighed. "Yeah. Yeah, I am now." I guess that still hadn't truly sunk in yet, but I wanted the "sinking in" to take a back seat. I needed to find Jane as soon as I had an actual chance, and I still didn't know how this world worked. I was talking to a snake-person about how I stole his girlfriend (not that I couldn't) and I'd seen people selling dust, the most annoying and boring thing ever where I come from.
Cyan began to look a bit more serious, and he looked like he had become an older man. "So am I. That tends to happen to Faunus from out of town, or even ones who just weren't lucky enough in life. You won't find many humans unless you look real hard. Humans like to get us out of the way." Racism really had a way of following me around wherever I went. I was about to reply but my stomach decided to join in on the conversation by grumbling loudly. I was still starving and one apple was not enough.
"Come on. I know the best places to "permanently borrow" some food." And with that, I made a new friend.
A few miles from Vale…
They searched the building, looking for anything of use and scanning for any unknown radiation. The old couple was held at gun-point in their own living room, trembling in fear at what might happen to them. The leader was standing in front of them, checking her scroll for any updates on her other groups. She couldn't be everywhere at once, but her organization was and leaving it to itself could be disastrous. Two armed men stood behind the old couple, the barrels of their guns a firm reminder not to move. They stood constantly at attention, not moving a muscle. One might have mistaken them for statues, but if you could see beneath their masks you would see just how afraid they were of their leader and what might happen to them and their family if they did anything wrong.
"We found it again!" The voice came from upstairs in the spare bedroom, and the leader quickly walked up to investigate, maintaining an air of fear around her. Once inside the bedroom she turned towards the man who made the discovery. Gulping silently he told what he had found before she punished him for inefficiency.
"The energy is localized to the bed, so we can assume that the unknown dimensional being slept on this bed. What is interesting, however, is that the energy is staying entirely localized to the areas that we can assume were touched from skin contact. There is none in the air and where the body and other clothed areas would be there is nothing. Only areas we can assume were touched by the head and hands have any traces of it."
The leader nodded before dismissing him. She needed to think about this and would not allow any distractions.
This energy was only being passed through direct skin contact. That meant that the being that came through the portal had been storing all of that energy inside it almost perfectly. What's more, the being must have been human, or at least looked very human, or the old couple wouldn't have refused to describe anything about them.
The woman smiled. This unknown being… it could revolutionize the entire world. Did the energy come from the portal, or the other dimension? Did this other world know how to use it? What had they created, how, and why? What life forms did they have? What was their style to creating things? And, far more importantly… how could all of this benefit her?
And her employer. If her employer ever thought for even a second that she would betray her, then the woman wouldn't last that night.
That was why the woman had to be extremely careful in what she concealed from her employer. F everything went according to plan…
The woman smiled. She walked back downstairs, she gestured to the two guarding the old couple.
Two miles away, a Grimm smelt blood and hurried to the source. It would be feeding on lots of negativity that night.
