When Justin Law was six, and Tezca Tlipoca was a teen, the two were stuck on a mission that went badly. After defeating an enemy, Tezca takes her possession as a keepsake to give to Justin.

"Justin!"

He felt more branches tearing into his bare arms, tearing up his skin, probably getting wet leaves on his new shirt-

"Focus," he thought to himself. "Don't let anything distract you."

Then he tripped on a root. As Tezca Tlipoca slammed chest first onto the ground, he felt what was atop his head bounce off and along the Brazilian forest floor.

"Damn it!" he grunted. He had to hurry. He pressed his hands down into the dirt-and upon feeling his pain receptors firing realized he had scuffed the palms of his hands during his fall-and tried to ignore the pain. As he dashed, he knelt down to pick up the object that fell off the top of his head: a headband with bear ears atop it.

15-year-old Tezca had wanted to get out of Death City for a bit, to go on an actual mission. Granted, he still lacked a meister. But why not join his classmates? How else was he going to find a partner if he couldn't go out into the field and show what he was made of?

Unfortunately, he chastised himself, what he was made of was weakness. How could he let some dumbass poacher who couldn't even tie her shoelaces knock him out and kidnap his classmate?

His lungs were burning. He stopped and doubled over, trying to catch his breath. He felt his eyes stinging, whether from the sweat falling from his forehead or his own emotions overwhelming.

"Justin!" he hoarsely called, barely above a whisper.

At that moment, he felt his knees buckle. He could not afford to collapse, not while that bastard had run off with his classmate. But the willpower of even a weapon was still only human. Tezca tried not to, but finally his weakness won out, and he fell to his knees.

And he just missed getting a bullet through his brain.

The round instead lodged into a tree trunk a few yards from him, shattering some bark. Hearing the sound of the bullet fired, Tezca instinctively slammed his body to the floor-his new shirt now completely covered in mud-and laid his arms to his sides.

Just his dumb luck: he loses all energy, and he fell down so quickly that he inadvertently dodged what should have been the poacher's headshot.

"Fuck!" the poacher cursed herself. After knocking out Tezca, she had hoped to run off with her hostage back to the rendezvous point, where her team had rounded up the rest of these DWMA interlopers. She had the kid with her, unconscious and draped over her knee, as she had dragged herself and the brat into a tree. The leaves had provided cover for her (not that Tezca had noticed: he had a laser focus on finding Justin that he would not have noticed the poacher above him even if the trees were barren), and the height above would allow her to take a shot. She knocked herself for not accounting for a demon weapon having (or what she assumed had) sensitive hearing the shot as soon as she fired.

The poacher readied her weapon to fire another shot, pushing the cassette player and headphones off her lap-a keepsake she had a habit of bringing with her on her more fun trips-and next to the brat, so neither it nor him would not get in the way.

But as she looked through her scope, she could no longer see her target.

"Hey, there."

She recognized the voice. She didn't need to turn to see Tezca's furious face. Instead, she dropped her rifle, letting it fall to the floor, and attempted to pull her gun from her hip holster. But she would not have seen Tezca's face anyway: he had already transformed it into a very large mirror, which magnified the little sunshine peeking through the forest's leaves into a very bright light that blinded the poacher. That was all the opportunity Tezca needed: he clutched the child-Justin Law-to hold him tight for protection but also as an anchor so that, with one kick, he knocked the poacher out of the tree and down to the ground.

Tezca waited until he heard the body slam onto the ground before he reverted the mirror between his shoulder back into his usual head and let out his breath. "Thank God," he groaned as he leaned back in the tree-and upon feeling no backing let go of Justin and started flailing his arms to keep balance. Thank goodness as well that five-year-old Justin, still unconscious, was heavy enough at his young age to hold Tezca down on the branch to prevent his own fall.

Tezca gritted his teeth and righted himself. He tried to calm himself before he started hyperventilating again. He didn't know what to do with his hands-his palms still bleeding-so he was surprised to feel his finger touching something smooth. He looked down: his bloody hands were coating Justin's blonde hair.

"Damn it!" he complained, quickly moving his hands-and almost falling back again out of the tree. Re-righting himself, he frowned. "How stupid of me." He began to study Justin's head: he hadn't spread much blood through Justin's hair, or, rather, he could not tell which blood was from his hands and which was from the nasty bump that poacher gave to the child.

"Damn it all," Tezca growled. "That fucking bastard."

Tezca transformed his left hand into a mirror and set it under Justin's nose and mouth. It fogged up.

"Good," Tezca said to his unconscious classmate. "You're still breathing. Hopefully be up and ready to go in a bit to save the others."

It took Tezca a few minutes to drape the unconscious child across his back, holding his tiny legs under his armpits and pulling his tiny arms around his neck to hold on as he would shimmy them both down the tree. But before they descend the tree, Tezca noticed the object in Justin's lap.

"A cassette player?" He tugged on the headphones to study them: big, bulky, and grimy. "Cheap poacher can't be bothered with a decent CD player?"

After getting Justin in place, Tezca could not resist looking over the branch down to the floor, to make sure the poacher had not escaped. She hadn't: if she wasn't dead from the fall, it certainly knocked her out.

"Hey, asshole?!" Tezca called to the poacher. "I'm taking back my friend! And I'm stealing your shitty cassette player and your big-ass headphones, too!"

For Tezca, it felt like it took him twice as long to get down the tree as it had to secure Justin around him for the descent. But they got down to terra firma again.

"God, you're heavy," Tezca whined as he gently planted Justin down next to the tree. While his legs felt exhausted, Tezca dragged them to the poacher's spot, as he glanced for what she was carrying. He then noticed the metal shining among all the leaves and mud. He walked to that spot and picked up her gun. He couldn't see her rifle anywhere, but carrying that would be too much a hindrance. Instead, he went back to the poacher and gathered up as much strength as he could to lift her unconscious-no, dead, definitely dead-body to remove her holster. He wrapped it around him, put the gun in, and walked back to Justin.

Next to the boy was the crappy cassette player and the big-ass headphones. Tezca bit his lip. "Well, a promise is a promise." He nestled the cassette player into Justin's shorts pocket and put the headphones around his neck.

"Come on, Justin," he said, as he lifted him up, again positioning his tiny legs and tiny arms so he could carry him. "Let's find where Pushka and the others are."

Tezca still didn't know where he was going to find his teacher and classmates. But at least he found Justin, alive.

Written as part of the theme, "Alive," for Day 2 of Justin Law Week on Tumblr.

My headcanon is that Tezca did not start with wearing a bear head. He started small with just a headband with bear ears on it.

And that's how Justin got his first headphones.