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 Posted: Sat Sep 07, 2024 7:32 pm
Someone was following Cassidy. He’d heard the rustling behind him about two minutes ago and he’d felt the presence of someone after that, too. He hadn’t turned to look, that was too obvious. He wasn’t going to let some creep get the satisfaction of knowing that they’d succeeded in freaking him out.
To no one’s surprise, his parents were busy. His dad was doing another shift and his mom was doing another date. He could have stayed home but he didn’t want to be in an empty house and he did actually have to get some things done. He was restless, but he needed to get some paperwork sorted out for school. He hated being in the car with his father so he’d made an excuse not to go to the clinic with him, and the buses ran often enough that it added only a measly ten minutes onto his trip.
Now that it was time to go home, it probably wouldn’t take much longer to get to where he needed to go. He just needed to get to a bus stop.
He chewed his gum aggressively. His palms were sweaty but maybe that was just because his hands had been balled into fists and he’d been putting a lot of effort into speedily stomping towards the nearest–
Well, it used to be a twenty-four hour diner, now it was a boarded up waste of space.
He’d been gone from Destiny City for too long. So much was the same but so much was different.
He wasn’t going to sit at a bus stop with some creep prowling and no one else around, but the more he walked, the worse he made it for himself. Seriously, in this town? No one was out? Where did they all go? It wasn’t even late yet!
Okay. Fine. He could take a shortcut and–
No, this was the wrong direction. If he kept walking straight, there was only a forest in front of him. He couldn’t go right, there was a chain link fence he might have been able to jump, but he wasn't looking forward to dealing with that barbed wire. He couldn’t go left, that was where his stalker was. He could hear them moving through the trees.
So, he could turn around. And have to pass back by whoever was following him, but maybe he could move faster than they could. Except, his nerves were getting to him. He didn’t want to look weak. He didn’t want them to think he was going to make whatever they were planning easy.
Cassidy clutched his phone in his hand. His hip was burning. His knee ached. His ankle felt like it was about to fall off. He was so tired of walking. Running was nearly out of the question and he’d avoid it if he could but he hadn’t made it back to Destiny City just to be some tabloid drama.
He spun on his heel and shouted in the darkness, where he could see some silhouette in the trees, and shouted in a very convincingly angry voice, “Stop following me! You’re not scaring anyone, you’re just pissing me off! So get out of here before I lose my temper!”
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Posted: Sat Sep 07, 2024 7:39 pm
s**t...
Reims grimaced as Cassidy called out into the darkness. There was a youma lurking about, and he’d been trying to lure it towards him and not any civilians. Naturally, he would end up knowing said civilian. And he should have assumed his luck meant that it would be Cassidy of all people.
He wasn’t trying to be creepy, he just wanted to stay close enough that if he had to, he could easily intercept the youma that seemed hellbent on stalking Cassidy.
Maybe it sensed Cassidy’s injury and knew he would be an easier target.
As if Reims would allow that to happen. Even if Cassidy liked to harass him and give him a hard time and tease him and mock him and--
“Keep your voice down, keep walking--” he finally spoke up, although it was more hushed than a shout. He was stepping almost backwards out of the shadows so whatever was skulking around wouldn’t get the chance to attack him from behind.
He had his sword in his hand, as though that could be deterrent enough. At least this way he could get Cassidy somewhere safe.
If he’d let him.
“I’m not some kind of cosplayer, okay? It’s magic,” he quickly added, because he was sure Cassidy would comment on his outfit. He was too busy scanning the shadows of the treeline that he’d just left to see Cassidy’s expression, although he was bracing himself to be laughed at.
In Cassidy’s defense, had he seen some weirdly costumed person walking around in the shadows, he would also think it was bullshit.
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Posted: Sat Sep 07, 2024 7:40 pm
“That’s a really suspicious thing to say!” he hissed, and though he was clearly not keeping cool, he had responded in a hushed voice. Keep walking where?
As Reims moved closer towards him, Cassidy started to back up in an effort to put some distance between them. He might not have understood but he was cautiously playing along, sort of. He didn’t know what was going on but he was smart enough to know that he shouldn’t piss off the guy with a weapon.
He kept his voice at a whisper but he still had a lot to say. “You have a sword! Who walks around with a sword? I’ve never seen a magician come out of the woods before, that doesn’t even make sense. You should have just said you were a cosplayer out here larping or something, that’s so much more believable. I would have said ‘nice costume’ and been on my way, now I have to figure out what kind of guy you are that your first instinct is to talk about your clothes and not the sword.”
Okay, so Cassidy wasn’t exactly great at keeping his cool when he was startled. He couldn’t even feel satisfied about being right about someone following him because the hair on the back of his neck was standing up. Something still felt wrong.
At least it wasn’t some middle aged man with a gun??
Cassidy didn’t walk backwards as well as he used to, and his calves were already burning from the effort so he had to rotate his body to try and shuffle sideways so he could watch Reims and move forward.
“What’s your magician name, are you any good? Do you cut your assistants in half with that sword or is it just for show? I thought I was running from you, what are you running from? You’re freaking me out. If this is a joke it isn’t funny, I have a heart condition so knock it off,” he whispered. Cassidy didn’t sound scared, he sounded like he was nagging.
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Posted: Sat Sep 07, 2024 7:41 pm
Well. Okay. Maybe it was something suspicious to say, but it wasn’t like he had really thought about what was suspicious and what wasn’t when he was trying to keep a youma from eating someone!
He was trying to ignore Cassidy’s nagging, focusing instead on the darkened treeline. He supposed it was fair to assume he was a magician since he said magic was involved. But while he was annoyed by all the questions, he only paused to turn to Cassidy when he mentioned his heart.
“You have a heart condition?” he stared, his expression softened with concern and sympathy as he was momentarily mentally disarmed. He searched his memory for anything that Cassidy or Elliot or Atticus or anyone might have said about Cassidy’s heart, but--
Had it been the accident? Were his injuries bad enough that his heart had been affected as well? Surely he wouldn’t have been playing so much baseball and running around if he had a heart condition before, but that didn’t mean anything.
Oh, but he needed to be focusing on wherever this chaotic aura was coming from, so he lifted his sword once more, but not before sparing a glance at it.
“It’s not really a sword,” he admitted, holding it up a little more to let the streetlight illuminate it and its panels of glass. “But it’s good enough. I’m not a magician, and I’m not trying to be funny. There’s monsters in the city and they try to attack people, okay?”
There was almost no heat in his voice, except for the urgency in which he wanted Cassidy to at least accept that he needed to get somewhere safer.
“Sorry, usually the first thing people comment on is my clothes,” he admitted, taking another few steps backwards towards Cassidy to put more distance between them and the trees.
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Posted: Sat Sep 07, 2024 7:44 pm
Okay, well it really wasn’t what Cassidy was expecting to hear. Destiny City was weird. He’d gone to the sleepovers, heard the horror stories, read the conspiracies online. It was all fake anyway. Well–
It would have been easier if it was fake. This guy seemed pretty serious.
Cassidy had the option of rejecting him and running off, or seeing it through. Running off seemed a little impractical, not when he was already internally whining about how badly he wanted to take a break.
So, he could play along. If this was a prank, whatever. Might as well have some fun with it.
“Why, do you get tired of hearing how good you look?” he asked. He kept pace with Reims’ steps but let the distance between the two of them lessen somewhat.
The look the stranger had given him was odd, to say the least. He sure did care a lot for a total stranger. He was gullible, too. Cassidy didn’t answer, he’d keep the excuse in his back pocket just in case.
“Sorry,” he said after a second. He was still speaking in a hushed tone but the urgency and stress of being followed had been replaced with curiosity instead. Yes, it was still weird. He still had goosebumps. Something still felt off. “I’m taking it seriously, I’m not making fun of you. If you’re not a magician, what are you? And what are you fighting? Oh, be careful. There’s a pothole on your left, don’t trip.”
Things just weren’t as unnerving when you weren’t alone, and the more this guy talked, the less dangerous he seemed. If he was really some sort of killer or human trafficker, he probably wouldn’t be self conscious about his outfit, or showing off that his sword was decorative.
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Posted: Sat Sep 07, 2024 7:45 pm
It was probably stupid for him to get worked up over something so small, but when Cassidy teased him about getting tired of hearing how good he looked, Reims felt his heart sink into his stomach.
He didn’t care if people didn’t like how he looked! Really! He just wished he didn’t have the reminder that he was weird or strange looking. Cassidy teased him when he was Riker, so it seemed fitting that he would mock his appearance even without knowing who he was.
“Ha ha, very funny,” he mumbled dully. Cassidy clarified that he wasn’t making fun of him, but it was still difficult to ignore entirely.
The warning about the pothole was appreciated at least, and Reims glanced over his shoulder to see it and stepped over it instead of potentially breaking his ankle.
“They’re monsters called ‘youma,’” he explained, because even if he felt a bit defeated, he didn’t think Cassidy should be left without the knowledge he’d need to protect himself. In theory.
“They look like animals… sometimes. But something you’d find in a horror movie. If you have to fight them, make sure you really try to kill them. They’ll just turn to dust, so that’s why there aren’t any dead monsters around. They take people’s starseed-- sorry. It’s like your soul I guess. And energy too, but you could just sleep that off. If your starseed is taken, you fall into a coma and die if someone isn’t able to get it back to you quickly enough.”
It was vague, but he knew Cassidy knew of people who mysteriously fell into a coma and died. There was Énna’s dad, for one. He didn’t talk about it, but the news got around.
“People comment on what I wear because usually--... the group of people who control the monsters wear darker clothes.”
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Posted: Sat Sep 07, 2024 7:46 pm
“I wasn’t making a joke,” Cassidy said offhandedly, because that was easier to address than the idea of what Reims was actually saying. “I don’t know anything about sides, I’m just saying–objectively, factually, you look good. What am I supposed to do, not compliment the guy who just rushed out of the forest to protect me from monsters? Like a prince out of some fairy tale.”
Was he trying to boost the confidence of some stranger? A little. His whole mood seemed to have deflated at the ‘joke’ Cassidy hadn’t made so it was pretty easy to see it was a sore spot.
Youma, okay. Monsters that looked like animals from a horror movie. He hadn’t run into any of them and his nose wrinkled at the idea of killing them. Even if they just turned to dust.
This didn’t sound like make-believe, though. It sounded made up but this guy didn’t sound like he was making it up.
“So where did you come from? Do you have any magic to fight the monsters, or just an outfit you didn’t pick out and a sword that’s not a sword?”
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Posted: Sat Sep 07, 2024 7:46 pm
Reims frowned. At all of it. He didn’t think that Cassidy was lying, but it wasn’t Reims’s fault that Cassidy was kind of known for his sarcasm and joking around.
And he knew it wasn’t the time to get all huffy about anything an old teammate said to whom he thought was a stranger, but it helped a little when he clarified.
Although Reims couldn’t help but snort quietly in amusement to be compared to a prince from a fairy tale.
“Thanks. I mean… factually... so do you,” he returned before he could really think about it.
Cassidy was pretty, he couldn’t deny that. And there was some comfort in knowing that Cassidy didn’t know who he was, so he could afford to be honest without Cassidy teasing him forever about it.
But now wasn’t the time for that. He was hoping they’d just quietly back away from the forest before whatever was going to attack them would attack.
“Not sure. Was attacked by one of those things one day and ended up with this outfit. I have some magic now, but not much. Mostly just enough to use as a distraction. Uh, I guess I’m what’s called a knight. Lame, right? Anyway, there are others who also dress weird that are, well, in danger of being eaten by youma. They’re Senshi, and they definitely have magic. But…”
Maybe he was rambling a bit too much. There was a lot to explain to someone who didn’t know anything about the war. And he felt guilty for pulling Cassidy into it, even if he didn’t know he was Riker.
“I’m Reims,” he introduced, momentarily glancing away from the trees so he could look at the other teenager, just to make sure Cassidy had a name to use, if he wanted it.
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Posted: Sat Sep 07, 2024 7:47 pm
Surprisingly, Cassidy didn’t recognize the young man in front of him. There was something familiar about him but he couldn’t place it. He’d been so sure that if they got under a street light or something he’d have known who it was, but the shadows were doing a decent job concealing his face. Sort of. He could make out enough.
They were still decently far away from anywhere safe. Trees lined this whole street. They could have snuck behind the building they were closing in on but he wasn’t sure if that was better or worse for dealing with some sort of monster. On one hand, there were few places for it to hide.
On the other hand, there weren’t any places for them to.
“You think being a magical knight is lame? Wow, high expectations. Nice to meet you, Reims. Sorry I thought you were a creep and yelled at you.” Especially because Reims was so polite and flattering.
Cassidy probably didn’t look his best. He’d been out all day, it was hot, he was sore. He was a little frazzled by this whole ordeal but despite how much his heart was actually pounding in his chest he was doing an expert job at brushing it off like this wasn’t anything to be concerned about.
“So if one of those things attacks me, I might get a neat outfit and some magic too? Let me at it. I’m just kidding,” he hissed, in case Reims didn’t have a sense of humor. “I’m running out of space to back up. If we keep going this way we’re going to go between some buildings.” He looked over his shoulder. “I mean, it’s a clear path, but you’re going to lose sight of the treeline so if it comes out, we’re not going to be able to see it.”
And if it was fast, it might beat them to the other side of the buildings before they had a chance to get away.
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Posted: Sat Sep 07, 2024 7:48 pm
“Don’t worry about it. I would have thought I was a creep, too. I was trying not to freak you out, but this one is being persistent,” he frowned, and then shot a warning look at Cassidy when he joked about fighting the youma so he could get magic.
Reims could see that they were running out of space to back up. He could still feel the aura of the youma. He was pretty sure he could hear it growling, although it might have been his imagination.
He didn’t like this at all. He didn’t want Cassidy, who apparently had a heart condition, to end up getting so stressed out that he would have to go to the hospital. And what if the youma actually attacked them and Cassidy got hurt? As annoying as the guy was, Reims didn’t actually want to see him worse off.
“I don’t like this. I want to take us somewhere safe,” he told Cassidy in a hushed tone, not wanting to draw the youma’s attention even more. What if it was the kind that understood what he was saying? Those existed, right?
“I’m not kidnapping you,” he clarified, and then cringed at himself. “I guess I should have just left that part out. But really, I’m not. Anyway, I need you to hold my hand. I’ll bring us back soon, I just want it to go away.”
Reims held out his free hand expectantly. He didn’t turn to look at Cassidy, instead making sure the youma wasn’t going to use that moment to jump out at them.
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Posted: Sat Sep 07, 2024 7:49 pm
In some ways, this felt like a game, and Cassidy thought it was wisest to just keep playing along and see how far it went.
If this was make believe, fine. If this guy was having very persistent hallucinations–well, also fine, but he’d have preferred to be somewhere a little safer if there was some sort of violence involved.
At this point, Cassidy wasn’t sure if Reims could kidnap him. They were roughly the same size. Cassidy had some weak points, but it’s not like Reims would have known.
He might not have had a fancy fake sword, but if Cassidy’s life was in danger, he’d have gone down fighting.
Reims’ hand didn’t look like an invitation to be abducted.
There was something sincere in the offer, so even if he didn’t understand, he couldn’t find a reason to say no. Was he playing into a delusion? Maybe, but what if he wasn’t? What if there really was a monster shuffling around in the distance, waiting to eat him?
What harm was there in taking Reims’ hand?
None, really.
Either this was real or it wasn’t, and this seemed like a lot of effort to be a trick. A high budget prank? He hadn’t seen any cameras.
Reims wasn’t even looking at him, he was still watching the trees like he really expected something to jump out.
“Okay,” he finally agreed. He drew out the word for a few seconds longer than he needed to, but he made sure his bag was secure on his back and he took Reims’ hand.
Cassidy wasn’t shy; he laced fingers with his hand and held on tightly.
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