I walked through the formerly quiet suburbs that had exploded in activity two days ago when the portal had opened. Cars labeled with one federal agency's name or another on every street for a mile around the epicenter. There were protests against the occupation, especially by the people who’d lived on the street where the Portal appeared and had been forcefully moved out.
The crowd of people around the fence that had been built at the entrance of the cul de sac giving me convenient cover as I observed the entrance. Then one of the DHS agents serving as guards made eye contact with me, and my heart fluttered. They looked away, but I had already started running away, trying my best not to hurt anyone as I pushed through the crowd.
“Hey,” I heard someone say, but I ignored it
“Hey, Jacob, stop running, idiot, and think!”
“Bug Jacob?”
“Yes, now can you tell me why you were about to have a panic attack?”
“I wasn’t-”
“Fine,” they interrupted, “Just tell me what happened then, I’ll see if I can help.”
“Can’t you read my mind or something, just watch that.”
“Yeah, but I can only see what you perceive. I’m left guessing at your emotions and thoughts, so please talk to me.”
I breathed through my nose to slow down my rapid breaths, finding a nearby bench and sat, the lack of noise from the crowd allowing me to get my thoughts in order, “I was going to go inside the portal.”
“... Can you tell me why you thought that was a good idea?”
“Urg and Seconds bodies, I want to find something that can hold them without exploding,” I shuddered when I remembered that frog exploding.
“Come on, there’s bound to be something, your human body carrying our soul is proof enough.”
“Outside of the ethics of body snatching someone, it also has a lot of holes. A person has pre existing history we’d have to deal with, an animal wouldn’t.”
“Fair, but how were you planning on getting past the guards?”
I let out a sigh, spreading across the bench as I said, “No idea, it’s not like I have Stealth anymore.”
Bug Jacob paused before saying, confused, “Yeah, you do, why wouldn’t you?”
I perked up, “The System, I don’t have it anymore now that I’m not in The Great Debate, isn’t that the thing that gave and facilitated my skills?”
“Well, first of all, you’re still connected to The System, Idiot. We felt it when the portal opened.”
“Oh, right…”
“Also, I’m pretty sure the System didn’t give us or facilitate anything, it just got us past the boring parts of figuring out our powers, so the Gods wouldn’t have to wait.”
“How do you know that?”
“I don’t, it’s called a theory.”
“Then, why should I trust what you said?”
“Don’t trust me, test it out. Try to use the system, or one of your skills.”
“Ok.”
I reached out towards the System like I had a thousand times before, finding my status page come to me as easily as it always had.
“Did I really not try doing that?”
“Seems in characters.”
After mentally flipping off Bug Jacob, I read my new status page.
Jacob Davidson
Species: Crowned Lunar Scale Moth
Error
Species: Human
Error
Species: Crowned Lunar Scale Moth
Error
Error
Species: ???
Level 0/???
Lunar Scale Moth
Antenna: Imperial, Crown of Lunaris
Wings: Imperial, Cloak of Lunaris
Tarsus: Imperial, Sceptre Of lunaris
Abdomen: Imperial, Heart of Lunaris
HP: Green
Lv: 25
MP: Green
Lv: 62
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
EP: Green
Lv: 30
Human
Eyes: None
Arms: None
Legs: None
HP: Green
Lv: 8
MP: Green
Lv: 62
EP: Green
Lv: 3
Core Skills: 5/5
Lunar Scale Dust
LV 10/20
0/10000
Moon Silk
LV 10/20
Royal Will
LV 13/20
Slip Away
LV 12/20
Lunar Aura
LV 1/5
Gained Skills: 3/5
Stealth
LV 10/10
Appraisal
LV 10/10
Split Focus
3/3
‘Huh? I could understand why the Species would have question marks around it, but why would LV have it? And what was with the new mutation section for my human half? Could I grow a second set of arms or something?’
I waved away the thought. I had come in here with a plan, and I could follow it without getting destracted. Buuuuuttttt… I scrolled to the mutation section again.
‘No, Bad Jacob, Bad!’
I mentally sprayed myself with water like a cat and got back on track, finding the Stealth skill and activating it. I went back to the protest in front of the camp the feds had set up, observing the people around me to see if the skill was working. And after I had been run into for the hundredth time in a second, I concluded it still worked.
It seemed I always fell into the corner of people's eyes when I activated it, faintly aware I was there, but just dismissing me offhand. Which was nice to figure out since I hadn't bothered to inside The Great Debate, and every piece of information could help.
And due to the nature of the skill, I kept it off until I was at the front of the pack of the protesters, practically smelling the chainlink fence. Then I activated Stealth, keeping an eye on the guards as my shaking hands grabbed the fence and I climbed it, dropping off the other side.
I looked side to side to see if anyone had noticed me despite knowing my skill was active. Then I walked past the barrier keeping people from seeing what was happening on the other side. I stopped and saw the portal again, a gray hole in the universe with a swath of pine trees on the other side.
I felt a weird feeling wash over me as I saw The Great Debate again, a weird mixture of terror and nostalgia, despite it only being two days. Then someone ran into me. I looked to the side, a tall man with salt and pepper hair and bags the size of blimps under his eyes.
“Oh, sorry, didn’t see you…?” He trailed off as he looked around for the person he’d bumped into.
But I was already long gone, having climbed over the fence in record time, and running back to the Bus stop.
O O O
I walked into the apartment me and my brother were staying after we’d been kicked out. The place belonging to a cousin named Barbra, who, up until two days ago, I hadn’t met since I was nine. But Boe had seemed to keep up. I closed the door behind me and fell onto one of the couches I had made my bed out of. The other taken over by my brother, who was surrounded by what looked like legal documents, tapping furiously on a laptop.
“What’cha doing?” I mumbled through a cushion.
He waved a hand, “Legal stuff about my house, you know, the one taken by the feds. Well, to no ones surprise, that’s super illegal, so I’m doing something about it.” He stretched, then said, “Anyway, what about you, did your interview go well?”
I looked at him, confused, until I remembered that I had gone out of the house to do that, “I don’t know, never actually gone to one, I've always been freelance. But after that, I was taken by a federal agent for some questioning, which was interesting.”
Boe looked up sharply, “What?”
“Did I do something wrong?”
“No, but it’ll make something… Eh, never mind,” He leaned forward, a piercing gaze pointed at me, “What did they ask you? Did they have a warrant, and what were their names?” Then they learned even farther forward, saying in a hushed tone, “Did they ask about your… magic?
“Um, well. They just asked me about what happened on the day the portal opened. I don’t know about the warrant. And it was only one dude, I think their name was something along the lines of Robert Jenkins. And nothing about… that.”
Boe took a deep breath in and slowly let it out.
I furrowed my brow, “Is everything ok?”
“Yeah, yeah,” they waved away my concern, “It’s just another thing to tell my lawyer.”
“Oh,” I said, a pause forming, “Um, speaking of legal stuff, the thing against my Landlord, when will I get my PC back? I can’t do any work on that crappy Laptop of yours.”
“Don’t insult Alicia.”
“Who?”
They pointed toward their computer, “Anyway, from what Alex, my lawyer, said, it should be around two or five months.”
I put my head in my hands, “Thats to slow.”
“I know, but believe me, that’s absurdly fast in the legal world, Alex is damn good at their job,” They laughed, “ Hell, I was only able to get them to do Pro Bono because they owe me and we’re friends from college.”
“Yeah, I know. But it’s still just… frustrating. I never thought that when I got back, I’d have so many things to put back together. I always imagine if something like this happened, it would just go back to how it always did.”
“That’s kinda absurd, if you force anyone out of their life for two months, there’s always going to be something to put back.”
“Well, there just wasn’t much happening in my life, so I thought… You know.”
“Yeah, I get it.”
Then our conversation was interrupted by the door opening, a person whose main fashion inspiration was cotton candy and flamingos walking through, Barbra, our cousin, and the person allowing us to stay here. Her roommate coming in behind her, a tall, drab looking butch lady named Samantha.
“Oh, hey, Boe and Jacob,” Barbra greeted us.
We made our greetings, then she started up a conversation which I completely dropped out of, only making half made and broken up replies when something concerned me. My brother translating for me since I didn’t know how to approach them.
A few moments later, a board game called Risk was pulled out. Apparently, it was a strategy game built around wars and stuff. I wasn’t that interested, but it was the only thing around to pass the time.
So after getting through the rules, we got to it, and I demolished everyone. I had always been good at these kinda games, but I had been forced to get better over the past two months. It was just a simple game of calculating the odds of my death. Then I felt someone tap my shoulder, and I jumped. I turned around and saw Barbra.
She flinched back, then said, “Um, the game's over.”
I looked at the board and saw everyone was putting their pieces away, then I muttered, “Oh.”
She looked at me with a weird expression and said, “Are you ok?’
I nodded, “Yeah.”
She pursed her lips but didn’t say anything.
After helping them clean up, me and my brother went to the couches and fell asleep. Well, at least Boe did. I just layed down with my eyes open, it had been like this the last two nights. I'd only gotten an hour or two of sleep before the sun or the bustle of people woke me, but strangely enough, I felt fine.
As I layed there, I felt like I was using one of my skills to look through someone else's eyes, then I got up and walked outside into the cold foggy night. My breath steaming up around my face like a wraith as I walked, and it felt like no time passed as I found myself back at the fence around the Portal.
