Unusual (Magick&SilentMadness)

[SilentMadness]

New Lincoln. A metropolis bustling with life. The place that one would find themselves lost into, a city that almost never slept. By day, full of crowded streets, citizens, shopping centers, business, and day-to-day life. By night, mostly brought to life by illegal racers and other such activities. A city of sky-scrapers, divided in several districts that segregated the different lifestyles and social levels.


From the Industrials, where one could easily notice the high level of pollution and middle to low class people walking about, to the "Empire" as it was called, where luxury and richness was at home. New Lincoln was never dissapointing in terms of diversity, gathering up about any nationality that could be, and mashing them up in an interesting, some would say odd mix. Zones with heavy Asian influences, some others looking like the classical South American places. New Lincoln had it all.


He has lived here for a good few years now, but it still didn't cease to surprise him. Although at 25, some could argue that he was already a lost cause. He'd messed up several jobs, he didn't have an intense social life, or someone to share other moments with. He was just another man in the city, taking, right now, a walk through the Central district, the only place where all the different cultures and all the different classes of the whole city met up for matters.


Usually, he wouldn't blend so well in crowds, due to the fact that he, well, despised crowds. But right now, he needed to. He couldn't live on welfare for the whole rest of his life, and so, he needed to find a job, but to find a job, he had to go out there and search. He only hoped he wouldn't end up in one of those moments. The last one was just a few nights ago but it still scared him that it could happen anytime. Yes, indeed, the chance was smaller if he was awake, but who even knew?


Dressed simply, with blue jeans, a pair of sneakers and a black hoodie, with the hood over his head, he made his way silently through the crowd, his green eyes scanning from time to time different faces he saw. So many people. And out of them, only he could do that. He would, actually, try to do it right at the moment, just to screw around with people's minds, but with such a big crowd, he wasn't exactly sure he wanted to see the final result. So he only kept to himself and walked.


Erik was a man with almost no past. Not because he woke up out of nowhere, but because he wanted none to know it. Even if perhaps then they could understand that he was special and why exactly he was like that, Erik did not wish for anyone else to know. He wanted to keep it a secret, and a secret it had to remain. Well, perhaps it wasn't so much a secret anymore since just night before, someone witnessed it, but it was better than it being seen by hundreds of people, all at once.

 

[Magick]

Riley hadn't slept well for the last few nights. It wasn't because of the traffic and noise outside of her apartment, or the obnoxiously loud tenants that inhabited the space below her. No, no. In comparison to what happened, that was almost preferred. She unlocked her phone, sliding the volume up, drums and guitar in her headphones drowning out the traffic and people that surrounded her. She was willing herself not to think about it, but it was difficult not to. Part of her still wondered if it had all been a dream. That was possible, wasn't it? People had vivid dreams all the time... But that had been too real.


She raised a hand to leaf her fingers back through the thick, dark coffee-colored bob on her head, absently reminding herself that it was due for a bit of a trim, considering its angle of fringe was beginning to tickle her cheekbone. Her hand dropped back to her side so it could slip into her coat pocket, leaving her hair a layered mess. It hadn't always been cropped so short; in fact, when she first moved to New Lincoln, it had been down to her waist. New place, new her. Her name was even new... Her parents had decided to call her Oriel. Oriel Arber. Where she was from, that was a nice name, but after moving to New Lincoln... It was apparently hard to say, and everyone that she had met had dubbed her Riley. Riley Arber. Riley didn't even sound like Oriel. No one ever did that back in--


Stop. Riley briefly closed her subtle blue eyes, willing her mind to pick a different direction than that. Any direction. Not any, she chided herself, her head revisiting the other night immediately. Not any. When she reopened them, she took a side-long glance at the people around her. They had phones pressed to their ears, some stared at the ground, and a few were walking by with cigarettes in their hands. She didn't stare at anyone too long, but she wouldn't have cared if they caught her looking anyway. She could give herself that much credit; she didn't care what people thought. It was really only what she thought that could get to her.


You are just bound and determined to ruin your own day, she thought bitterly, attempting to focus in on the music that blared in her ears, her chin burrowing slightly into the dark flannel scarf that puffed up around her coat collar. Her black messenger bag swayed along, the few button pins on it clinking together while she walked, unbeknownst to her. The hard heels of her short, black combat boots clicked along the sidewalk, one of them feeling a little looser than the other. As much as she hated to do it, she was probably going to have to stop and retie it, just so it wouldn't come completely undone.


Sliding to the curb, she knelt onto the concrete of the sidewalk, situating herself by a black lamppost, and untied the boot. As she tightened the strings, she glanced up, watching the other side of the street. She had tightened and tied this particular boot three different times that day, which was often enough that she didn't need to look to do it. Instead, she ran through the things that she needed to do when she got home, which was restring and tune her guitar, do the dishes, and have a drink... not necessarily in that order, either. I wonder if I should get a cat, she half-joked with herself. Twenty two and on her own, and that was all she wanted to do after work. She could text one of her few friends, but it didn't sound like that great of a plan. It had been a long day at the bar, and she had to get up early tomorrow to get to her second job.


Why had she ever come to this city for university? She certainly hadn't fit in with the other international students. Of course, she'd been done with school for nearly two years. Riley was the slightly proud owner of a degree in music and another in theatre. What great use it had been in the city... The musician world was a bit kinder, and every so often she caught an open mic night at a gig that she was asked to host. However, it was hard to get rid of your 'accent' for performance auditions. In her head, she didn't have an accent. Everyone else sounded as if they did. "You might want to get out of the way," someone grumbled at her, not stumbling far enough away, because his knee knocked into her backside. She couldn't hear him, but she offered him a silent glare that said "screw off." Riley looked back down at her shoe once it was tied, and then brought herself back up to her full height, which was a bit above the average for most women. She decided to lean against the lamppost, pulling out her phone to change the song. She looked back up, scanning the ever-moving crowd. It wasn't as if she was in any rush to get home.


Riley's eyes flitted to no one in particular. Her phone buzzed, so she glanced down for a moment, but when she looked back up, a black hoodie caught her eye. Surprised that its owner seemed so familiar, she straightened, no longer leaning on the lamppost. How did she know him? Or did she? Turn your face this way, she thought, a bit dryly. When the moment came and she caught a glimpse of more than his profile, Riley went still. Surely she wasn't seeing who she thought. What, did fate have a sick sense of humor, or something? No way, she leaned to the right, trying to get a better look, going so far as to step onto the edge of the street. Probably not the wisest decision she had ever made, but she was making an exception to make a few stupid decisions that day, which was why she gave the oncoming traffic a slight glance before sprinting across the street.


She didn't know this man, or if he was even the same one... But surely he was. Riley inhaled slowly, feeling her adrenaline take a running leap as she followed him. He hadn't hurt her that night... hell, the man hadn't done much more than look confused. Regardless, she knew she had to be careful. People weren't scary, and even if she did have a height advantage... What was it? Kick, spray... oh, some shit like that. Riley recollected what she remembered of self-defense, knowing that she had mace somewhere in her bag, and knew that she could run if she needed to. The problem was, she probably wouldn't run. It wasn't in her nature, but apparently, stalking was. I should've got a degree in this, she thought bitterly, comforting herself with her always-trusty sarcasm.

 

[SilentMadness]

He continued walking, minding his own business. He chose to block the outer world by wearing headphones, and pulling the hood over his head, hoping that he isn't that much of a notable feature in the crowd. And it seemed to work for the most part. He didn't notice, at first, that he was being followed. With the outer sounds completely muted, it wasn't hard to understand why. Even with his extra-precautions and his habit of taking a glance back every now and then, this particular time he simply chose to keep his head down and his face concealed to the best. What if he met her? The woman from that night? The scene replayed in his mind and made him feel the same embarrassment he had felt back then.


He felt the pain in his side as he hit the cold wooden floor. That was what snapped him out of the tormented sleep full of nightmares that he's had. Clearly not the best night ever, not for him. His eyes were stinging as he opened them, nearly lulled back into the dreamworld by the sleep. However, he struggled to stay awake, for he reckoned he might have fallen out of bed. A mind clouded by sleeping pills yet told him that he was not at home. The floor at home near his bed was covered by a carpet. This... wasn't. Standing, on the verge of throwing up from the dizziness, he cast a confused glance around at the same time as he saw a small light that cast away the darkness, and heard slow steps coming from nearby.


With no time to react, however, he soon found himself standing before someone. A woman, dressed in shirt and shorts, who looked, in all truth, perhaps more surprised than he was. Her shocked face was the last thing he recalled before he finally came into his senses enough to use his ability and move himself back into his own house. Eversince, he has been wondering who she was.


He didn't notice her following him at first. It was just another person in the crowd even if his paranoia told him to keep clear and rush forward. And from there on started a strange change of the pace, in which he tried to determine whether or not that person was following him. He could sense her, a pair of eyes burning in the back of his head, causing him an unpleasant sensation. But he decided to continue down the road and not look back. Maybe that'll make them go. Whoever they were.


But it seemed to be a constant presence that trailed in his steps, every moment, closer. The pressure was making his heart race and his body become all tensed up, as if he was in the gym, picking up a hell of a weight. Enough was enough, he convinced himself, gathering all the power inside him for the moment. And so, turning on the heels of his sneakers, he faced fully with whoever followed him. "Okay, what do you..." he managed to say before his jaw remained loose, and a loud gasp escaped him. It made some people toss a glance at the scene, making it the more awkward.


He stood there, gazing down in the eyes of the woman he'd accidentally visited a few nights ago. His face now turned from pale to red and back to pale, his heart was drumming in his chest and his body was horribly weak. He found himself unable to mutter any other word, and just stood there, gazing at her. He couldn't believe it. Why, out of all the persons that he could meet, did he have to meet her? There was a slight bit of curiosity in there too, but all he could do was throw an apologetic gaze, and nearly rip the headphones out of his ears. He found himself panicking, the effect becoming worse and worse until all he could do was utter a "Forgive me." before turning around and storming off, trying to get lost in the crowd. He knew he should expect a negative reaction from her, and he didn't want to face that.

 

[Magick]

Riley had realized upon his turning around that she had no idea what to say or even ask him. She hadn't expected him to gasp, so she stiffened at it, a little taken aback. Sarcastic scenarios played out in her mind as she watched his face pale and redden, not helping her in the least to conjure some sort of intelligible reply. Hello, perfect stranger. Fancy meeting you again. On the sidewalk this time, not my flat in the middle of the bloody night... His mumbled apology brought her out of her grim humor, causing her to raise an eyebrow, mildly confused. Forgive him? In all senses of the word 'forgive,' someone would have to have done something wrong to say that. Riley wasn't even entirely sure he had done something wrong, aside from showing up in her small living room in the middle of the night. It was just the fact that he was there and then he wasn't that irked her mind so much. She had thought he was a burglar that night. The next several, she thought he had been some strange dream. Burglars didn't-- no, people. People... they didn't disappear. "Hey, wait just a moment--" she called, her accent sticking out among the chatter and white noise of the busy sidewalks.


She pulled her own headphones out and disconnected them from her phone as she attempted to follow him, stuffing the small device into her jeans' pocket. There weren't very many times being a taller woman came in hand, but today happened to be one of the rare days. Riley wasn't exactly dainty; she was a lean, lanky person, so it made sliding through people a bit easier. Why am I even chasing this man? She knew the answer to her own question, but it didn't seem to be enough at that moment. Riley didn't want to cause a scene... she could chase him down if she wanted to, probably. She had long legs and a long, advantageous stride... Though they still ached a bit from her morning jog. "Hey, I'm talking to you--?" she broke off, not sure what to call him.


It was at that moment, Riley felt the full weight of the realization that she had no idea who he was, what to call him... Nothing. It had just been dreadfully obvious that they knew exactly who the other was, and perhaps that was why she had started following him so easily in the first place. If she had been thinking straight--wasn't that always the problem?--then perhaps she would have realized that from the start. This could have been a really stupid decision; perhaps it still was. She was capable of protecting herself, but what if he had attacked her?


Riley thought about that for a minute, but then decided against it, her mind replaying the other night as she pushed past people. She had been in bed after closing at the bar that night. Truthfully, she had been a little tipsy herself. Riley remembered pulling on her flannel shorts and saying to hell with it, wearing black T-shirt she had worked in and basically passing out in bed. She woke up to some unnatural thud... It had been too loud to be one of her neighbors, so she had climbed out of her tangled bed sheets to investigate outside of her dark room. Perhaps it was merely her odd sense of humor that she had considered taking some old fencing gear out there with her. But she hadn't, and instead moved down the hallway to peer into the living room, lit only by a window of streetlights and headlights, and there had been this man. This nameless stranger. And then he disappeared.


Well, she wasn't letting him do that again today. Riley nearly ran into a few people before she decided to stick to the edge of the curb. She was tall enough to see him, and with any luck, there would be a break in the crowd. In the back of her mind, Riley was vaguely aware that she was dangerously close to cars of all sizes buzzing by in the streets, but she took that out of her mind for the moment. It probably wasn't wise, though, making good decisions had never really been one of her stronger qualities.

 

[SilentMadness]

His attempts at escaping her were fruitless, as it seemed, but what could he do? She was on his tail, she was tracing him, a pair of eyes was burning holes in the back of his head and the guilt was too much. Plus the shame. And the fear. She only wanted to take a better look at the freak show. That's what everyone ever wanted, eversince he first came out to a person about his special ability that he'd gained after being the subject of a rogue experiment. It all spiraled out of control, and now he was destined to run forever, from everything and everyone. And I did that so fucking well until I screwed up in my sleep and brought myself here, he thought angrily as he continued trying to blend in the crowd.


And there she was, still behind him, he realised as he turned his head only briefly to gaze back. If only he wasn't in the middle of a street, he could probably just teleport away and dissapear, maybe this time, for good. He couldn't risk it. Anything at all. He needed to make off. But she wasn't letting him, and that was the worst part of it all.


He couldn't very well run, the crowd was too tight, it seemed as if everyone was going out for some reason, like a cruel joke of fate. The only way to escape is to stop running, and face her, dude. His inner voice told him, an inner voice that was more often than not, right. He hated it. It was like something inside him was more mature, more experienced and wiser than his normal self. Maybe it indeed was, or maybe it was just his mind going out with a blast. But he had no choice. He had to stay, and endure. What could be so bad? She will ask, he will answer, and in case she would call some authorities, he could dissapear in the blink of an eye. Yes, that was what was to happen.


Stopping from his near-running, he eventually turned around and shyly approached the girl. He didn't have the courage to gaze at her, and so, he tried to look in other ways as he stopped at a fair distance from her. "I... er..." He began, only now realizing he actually didn't know what to say. And what was there to say, even? She hadn't asked him a thing, so should he really say something? "... I'm... sorry for running, Miss..." He continued, realizing just how stupid that sounded. No, he had other things to worry and apologize for and this was the only one he could do? Seriously? Was that it? "I'm also sorry for that night back then... I... I didn't mean to and... er..." I can teleport, and I'm a freak of nature, so you might as well call for the circus now and be over with it! His inner voice completed in a sarcasm that was definitory to it, causing him to be angry at himself. Really, his line of excuses was a joke, and he himself was acting weird, odd, strange... You're just acting as what you are, so you might as well embrace it, the inner voice chimed in again. That one person in his mind, the other him, was the only constant presence in his life. One he would gladly live without.


The distant sound of a truck horn, approaching at high speed, however, gave the scenery a lot more in terms of dinamics, as people began to scream and panic. Erik only needed to turn his head to understand what was going on. A red truck was plowing through traffic at very high speed, so high that it pushed everything out of its way in the crazy run. Out of control, completely. The turn of wheels, however, directed it straight on the sidewalk on which Erik and the stranger girl were on, and the whole scenery turned into a painfully long, slow-motion film. Erik could see how the first people in the truck's way were being completely obliterated, all while others around him and the girl were jumping away or running from the scene. His mind was muddy, and he had to make a quick decision. The truck was inching closer, and closer, until the pressure caused him to break, and in a matter of moments, he caught the girl in a swift embrace and in a matter of moments, disappeared with her, soon enough, materializing on the opposite sidewalk, under the shocked gazes of the people.

 

[Magick]

The past two minutes were fuzzy. Perhaps it was the adrenaline of chasing a total stranger down a crowded sidewalk in New Lincoln, or even the fact that he seemed to try to stop and talk, apologize for running, even. The questions in her head swam around, but Riley knew she probably needed to clear her head before she would have any sort of decent reply. She knew that the problem with that was that she probably wasn't going to get the opportunity to do, given the fact that this man could... disappear. Finally, she had taken a deep breath, preparing herself to ask how he had even done it. The other questions could come later; this. This was what puzzled her the most. She had hardly managed to utter the beginning of her question when she heard the panic. "How--" Riley's head turned after the stranger's head did, assuming he was seeing what was happening.


She had started to stagger back when she noticed the red truck. It was hard to miss, given that it was headed straight for them. Riley's mouth was ajar, as if she had been going to say something, but her eyes didn't leave the truck coming straight for them. What Riley had been expecting was to maybe have time to swear, or make herself try and move, though she was frozen solid. Was she going to die? Given how fast the truck was barreling, taking down everything in its way... That seemed rather likely, in her mind. However, she felt the man next to her move, felt herself in an embrace, and by the next time she blinked, there was no red truck.


Jumping backwards from the stranger, doing a double-take at her surroundings, Riley's confused, startled reaction was not in response to the stares of the crowd, but how in the hell there had been a truck coming for them, and now there wasn't. Getting a better grip on reality took her a few seconds, but she quickly realized that the street was now on the other side of the sidewalk that she had been on originally, and she could still hear panicked voices, shouting, curing, some crying... Riley was becoming increasingly aware of the people around them, their eyebrows furrowed together, whispering to one another, some just blatantly speaking aloud.


If you asked her, Riley couldn't explain what possessed her to grab the stranger by the elbow, but she did, and she started to pull him into a run with her. Dodging people was a bit difficult when you were dragging a man by the elbow behind you, but it seemed like a good idea to get out of the limelight. "I live a few blocks from here," she offered back to him, not looking, though she knew he had no reason to follow her. He could detach from this dash anytime, and part of her was pretty sure that she would follow him regardless, because she still had questions.


Still unsure if she was acting out of adrenaline or pressure or what, Riley eventually assumed she would regret it later, if there was cause for her to do so. "We just need to get out of this crowd. Head towards thirteenth street," Riley felt a bit odd, knowing that he had actually already been where she was headed. "That's where my flat is... Apartment. Whatever the hell the people here call it," she muttered the last part to herself more than the stranger.

 

[SilentMadness]

Thirteenth, he repeated in his mind, as if he tried to burn the number in the back of his head. They wouldn't get away so soon what with the whole shock going through people, extending towards them as a shockwave. They had to dissapear, completely. Accidental as it was, his teleportation back in that night allowed him to somehow... memorize the location. That was the only certain thing he could establish about his weird ability: If he has been there, it was a pinned point on the map in his mind, involuntarily. He had to help them both dissapear right then and there, and so, before the girl could even reach the corner with the thirteenth, he grabbed the hand that was tugging his elbow and suddenly made both himself and her vanish without a trace.


The scenario around them changed quickly to the one in the room in which he had accidentally teleported that night, in her flat, and boy, it felt like an awkward trip. However, he felt a slight exhaustion. It was the cost of being able to shift through space, too much at one time and it caused fatigue. He still didn't come around to the solution to energy depletion, but he was in the process of learning it. In the beginning, it would be way worse, as he could only pull off one teleportation and even that strained him to the point of fainting.


"Okay... we're out of the red zone." He concluded as he looked at the girl, realizing that he now had not even a clue what to tell her. The truth, you dumbass, the fucking truth. You've already dragged her into this, and she didn't run from you. Or well, not yet. Just explain it to her. His inner voice intervened, causing him to sigh. She'd laugh. No way she would take him seriously. But she has seen it. She wouldn't be able to laugh it off even if she wanted. She had to believe him.


"Right, I suppose... I owe you an explanation for this shit." He said with a sigh as he plopped himself on the nearest couch and rubbed his temples to push away the headache that threatened to kill him. "Um... well I..." He began, almost starting to laugh at how ridiculous it was going to sound. "I guess you've seen those... comic book superhero movies born out of experiments and all that crap and... eh... oh well... you might think those are totally a fantasy and they don't ever exist in real life... I guess. But... well..." He struggled to keep the order of ideas in place, all while being assaulted with memories from a distant past.


Memories of the children he was aligned with. The caretakers at the orphanage had told them someone was coming that day to pick a few of them for some interesting things. They were going to be lucky. He still recalled the face of the man with the white lab coat that pointed at the children that he wanted, children amongst whom he was as well. He remembered it all as if it was yesterday, the road in the black tint windowed cars towards an unknown location, the promise of great treatments and the suffering that had to follow. The day when he was the next in line for something that will change his life forever. And the great failure that resulted in this. It was all fresh in his mind.


"Well, here I am. I can teleport. And now the entire fucking city probably knows it already." He grunted in frustration, sighing unnerved by the whole situation. "That's how I ended up that night here... by accident."

 

[Magick]

Streetlights, people, panic, and horns all turned into her quiet flat. Riley turned around this way and that, almost in disbelief that they were really where she thought they were. Familiar white walls, hardwood flooring, a coffee table, a small black sofa... Her hair, already disheveled, was even more so when she ran a hand back through it, trying to get herself to calm the hell down and focus. There was no doubt that they were standing in her livingroom. She exhaled slowly, only halfway paying attention as the stranger sat himself on the sofa. The moment Riley actually turned her attention towards him fully, still breathing a little heavily from the confusion, was when he began to explain, and she listened. Her expression didn't change he described it all. Comic books, fantasy? Those were things she never thought ever actually existed, but they were things that her adolescent-self had wished were real.


"You can teleport," she repeated the words slowly, leaning her back against the wall next to the doorway to the kitchen. "You can teleport." Riley said it again, this time, a bit more firmly, as if she was no longer testing the answer, but merely trying to accept it. Is it hot in here? wondered Riley. It felt like it, so she started pulling off her denim jacket and scarf, revealing a large, dark green sweater that hung off-center, revealing one black spaghetti strap and part of her shoulder. She dropped the material onto the ground beside her and then slid down the wall into a sitting position, a few pieces of hair pressed upwards against the wall. "You mean to tell me that something happened to you that made you able to... do this? Or is that just in the comic books?"


Her phone began to buzz repeatedly in her pocket, but she wasn't calm enough yet for it not to startle her. She moved awkwardly to pull it out, seeing that it was a phone call from Finn, a co-worker of hers from the bar. Disregarding the call, she gingerly placed the phone on floor. Its vibrations moving it ever so slightly, she refocused her attention on the man. Briefly,s he closed her eyes, inhaling deeply and exhaling slowly. "Look... Who are you? For starters. I really followed you today... Because I wanted to know who the hell showed up in my flat... apartment-- oh, whatever you people call these things..." managing to frustrate herself rather quickly, Riley repeated the single, drawn out breath. "The fact that you vanished into thin air was a secondary question. Look. My name is Ori--... Riley Arber." With her arms resting on the caps of her folded knees, she looked over at him, a string of calmness, whether it was forced or not, lining her face. "I've told you my name... Care to tell me yours?"

 

[SilentMadness]

"It's a... long story." Erik said with a nod. "And yes. I can teleport." He continued, as to assure the woman of the fact that she hasn't heard anything wrong. He could, indeed, teleport, even though for now it was still hard enough to control it without him ending up in places. Even after all these years. And now he made an acquaintance based solely on that. This was awkward. Moreso, it was terrifying to think that now probably the whole town was looking for an unnamed guy wearing a black hoodie who pulled off perhaps the most unbelievable trick they've ever seen.

"I'm Erik. I don't think it's important for you what my other name is. And yes, as you can see..." He said before suddenly dissapearing from where he sat only to appear on the very opposite end of the room. "... I can teleport. There was a time when I wouldn't be able to do this more than once a day, but that was right after I've gained my ability. And it wasn't a painless process either. I wasn't born like this." He said before again dissapearing, and rematerializing in another spot in the room. "They made me into what I am now. I've been trying to hide it eversince but well... you've seen it already, so I guess I can't hide from you anymore now, can I?"

******************

"The Central district of New Lincoln has been the scene of a horrific accident, with ten dead people and more than 12 injured. Witnesses saw a truck that has lost its control and made its way through the crowd on the sidewalk. It appears that the truck's driver suffered a heart attack and was unable to keep the vehicle in control any longer. Witnesses also speak of a particular couple who somehow managed to escape the carnage by teleportation, as they have declared."

He sat there, with his eyes fixed on the TV that continued running on the news channel. Could it be? It has been more than 10 years eversince number 89, his greatest experiment, had dissapeared. Could it be that this was just 89 having failed to blend into the crowd any longer? He has heard, throughout the time, of different locations and cases of a particular person being able to dissapear and move from place to place at free will, but he was never able to trace it down. However, now it seemed different. New Lincoln. This was where his greatest experiment might be hiding now.

Grinning to himself, the mysterious man leaned back into his chair with a glass of whiskey with ice in his hand, and grabbed the telephone on his desk. It was time to reignite the flame.​

 

[Magick]

The first time that Erik disappeared, Riley shifted a little, her body stiffening. The next time, she only remained stiff, not even beginning to understand the bare minimum of the physical possibilities--or impossibilities--of it. A man that could teleport. The thought struck her funny, though she didn't laugh, watching him move about different points of the room. Eventually, her body relaxed again, her head tipping back against the wall as she let it all sink in. It wasn't going to be a short process, but perhaps if she told herself it would be... No. Riley had no idea if this was even the last time the two of them would speak. He had saved her from that truck--


This man had saved her life. The heaviness of that realization was beginning weigh down on her. Riley studied his face for a split second before her eyes went to the floorboards. Would she have died today, if not for him? Actually, if she hadn't been so reckless as to follow him, Riley never would have been in the situation in the first place. Though that wasn't even completely true, because he had shown up in her apartment in the middle of the night. Her mental smart mouth silently told him that he should consider himself lucky that she had been so tired; she had to take several classes on stage combat when pursuing her degree, and had been part of the fencing team at her university. Had she not been so tired, Erik would have found himself at swordpoint, more than likely.


His words struck her funny. He didn't have to hide anymore. It was ironic, because she was pretty good at hiding, herself. Only her reasons were entirely different. "It's a little hard to hide from someone when you show up at her flat in the middle of the night," she said, her voice a bit flat. She had meant it almost jokingly, because that was her favorite defense mechanism, but she hadn't exactly recomposed herself from the events of the past hour. "Regardless. You, uh... I don't have work tonight. Or I might. But you're welcome to stay here. If you want to, that is," she added as an after thought. Get up, Riley. She pushed herself up, coming to a stand against the wall. "At least until things settle down. If any of those people feel the way I did for a few minutes there... Right, that's not the point I'm trying to make. It's the least I can do, considering you did save me. It's not like you had to, so, I owe you."


Riley's slim hand reached to scratch the back of her head. What she needed to do was get some tea in her system and take a shower. It wouldn't make anything that happened go away, but it would make her feel a little better. "Do you drink tea? Alcohol? Fizzy-- damn slang... Soda? Sodie? Pop? Whatever people call it here. Water?" she sounded as if she was talking to herself, though it was really directed at him. Somedays, Riley hated being an international person. It had been hard enough to say trousers 'instead' of 'pants,' let alone remember every individual slang term. "If you want something to drink, just let me know, is what I'm trying to say."

 

[SilentMadness]

"Fizzy? Remind me on what planet do they call it that?" Erik retorted with a forced joke, bringing his brows together in a funny manner for a moment. The atmosphere was way too tensed up and way too uncomfortable, and he knew he needed to turn it into something else. Her offer was most generous, however, he didn't know anything about this person. What if she had friends, what if she was popular enough for people to come swarming at her door, having seen her dissapear with what, a mutant. Yes, mutant, that was precisely what Erik was. Or, as the scientists liked to call him back then, an "enhanced human".


"I um... I have an apartment. I live pretty much on the other side of the town." He said with a shrug, standing as well. "Gets kinda lonely at times. It's not so bad though. If only my abilities wouldn't go crazy while I'm sleeping and have me ending up in different places. Not the first time I end up in a stranger's house."


It was all true. Eversince the day he escaped, he has struggled to maintain his stability and not lose control over his power. But I didn't really manage to, did I? He asked himself in a bitterly ironic tone, trying not to slip into the dark mood that usually set in when he started remembering all that he has been through. "I was actually heading to find myself somewhere to work at, but things got in the way and..." He said, before his phone suddenly rang. Shoving his hand into a pocket, he took it out, and swiped the screen to answer.


"Erik. You gotta turn the TV on, man." A familiar voice spoke from the other side. Perhaps his only true friend, Dylan. "Uh... I... I can't right now, what's so urgent?" Erik asked, his face suddenly turning pale as he heard the answer. "Your fucking face is all over the news." Dylan answered, causing Erik to nearly lose his footing and feel the need to sit back down again, all while throwing a deeply concerned gaze to Riley. "Can you really teleport?" Dylan asked, but Erik found himself unable to respond. He could feel the fear and wonder in his voice, and he wasn't going to go any further. "Eh... listen, I gotta go, I'll talk to you soon." He rushed, shutting down his phone before throwing it somewhere on the floor and letting his head fall into his hands heavily.


"Shit..." He muttered. "I am horribly sorry, Riley... I might have just dragged you into the biggest pool of shit you've ever been in." And indeed, so it was. He knew what was coming. The ones from whom he's been running his whole life. They wouldn't let him get away that easily, would they? And given that his face now was all over the news... it could only mean one thing. They've seen him. They knew where to look for and whom to look for. This was way worse than so many other things that could've happened. "The guys who did this to me... we're on the news, and they're surely going to come after us. I'm sorry..."