Eren rose from his seat. In front of him was a complex spread of buttons and small levers with a steering wheel in front of him. The handles were white with a black middle with an insignia on it.
The base of the symbol was a black and white shield with a vertical line in the middle, with a bunch of black shards on the white side of the shield and white shards on the black side of the shield. They seem to form wings made of unconnected shards.
He looked through the large tinted glass. It was so clean. So transparent. Even with his enhanced sight, he couldn't see a crack or scratch. Beyond the glass was darkness. A darkness so vast that there wasn't an end in sight.
But even when surrounded by darkness, there were sparks of light. Some were small, some were large, with an array of different colours shining through the void.
He opened his mouth in awe as he witnessed the other ships flying around him. Some were large and bulky, while some of them were small and sleek.
"I never thought I would see this. Centuries of being contained, being trapped. Hidden cameras surrounded every angle of my room like a criminal. Monitored by the eyes of suspicion and paranoia. Waiting for me to just...lose it...rebel...Thank you...for bringing me along, Eren..."
He turned to see a woman. Short in stature and petite in frame. With long, wavy blonde hair nearly touching the metallic floor beneath them. Her skin was fair, and her eyes were greyish green with a small glint around her pupils.
He approached her and looked into her eyes. With the reflection coming from them, he saw a glimpse of himself, older, taller, with long white hair and a heavy stubble.
He forcibly felt his eyes as he closed the distance between him and the mysterious girl and..
Eren woke up frantically with his body drenched in sweat, with strands of his hair going in different directions as the alarm on his phone rang loudly.
He was breathing heavily, but he took a few deep breaths and slowly got out of his bed. His room was average-sized and plain, with white walls and a black armoire featuring a black plastic hamper next to it.
"That dream again…"Eren turned off the alarm on his phone before he rubbed his face with his left hand. "Who is that? I've never seen her before."
Eren turned to his side table to turn on his phone to check the time. It was 2:30 pm. "Holy shit, the entrance exam starts in an hour. Gotta get up now!" Eren stumbled out of his bed and went to his bathroom to take a quick shower. He winced a bit as he headed to the bathroom.
"Damn, that bitch really did a number on me last night," Eren said, rubbing his injured sides.
"I'm surprised that I even won that fight. But now I could hardly even move without feeling the pain."
Before he went to take his shower, he took off his chain, and he looked at it. The pendant was a golden sword with a red gem in the pommel, which then connects to a hoop for his new 24-inch,2mm gold chain to go through.
He placed it on a cheap, plastic hook that he stuck on his bathroom door and began to take his shower, but the water was too cold, so he turned the knob towards the hot water mode, but the temperature didn't change.
"Really?! It's not working again?!"Eren said, slightly irritated. The hot water wasn't working, but he didn't mind taking a cold shower; he got used to it. It wasn't the first time that the temperature got fucked up.
After his shower, he dried himself off and looked in the mirror. He smiled before he flexed the biceps of his slim but athletic build, including a solid chest, visible obliques and toned 8-pack abs, proof of his training and fighting experience, but because of his recent scrap, he has bruises of purplish red hues on his upper and lower body with small white smoke coming out from his injuries.
"Thank you, weird body disorder," he said, poking one of the healing bruises on his body. "And it seems that my black eye is now gone." He looked at his somewhat long and round face, giving his face shape more of an upside-down triangle. His eyebrows were thick, black and slightly furrowed, making him always seem ticked off. He gently touched a bit of his hair. His straight yet thick, coarse black hair was nearly grazing his shoulders, with the ends of his hair being a faded-out white after not redying it in years, making them look more like highlights.
Eren dried himself with his white towel before he rubbed cocoa butter lotion on his skin before putting on black slim cargo pants, a white t-shirt, black boxers and black socks. He went to his closet and took out his creased Nike white and black high top Air Forces and a black weight jacket on top of his tank top, under his white hoodie and a plain black bomber jacket over the sweater.
"I know I'm stupid for doing this, but I'll just take it off if I'm struggling," Eren said to himself as he lightly smacked the weight vest.
He placed his chain back on around his neck, tucked it under his sweater and walked out of his room and to the kitchen to make breakfast. He lived in a 3 ½ apartment that belonged to a tenant who died in The Magala Incident, so when he and his sister snuck in, they lived in it for a week before they got caught by the landlord.
Luckily, with a lot of convincing involving money, they were able to live in it, but they had to clean the apartment themselves, taking out most of the tenant's stuff. They kept was the necessities like the toiletries, dishes, utensils, some of his clothing and his electronics like his television and his laptop, so they had two laptops, one from their old home in the underground and one from this apartment.
He opened his fridge, but he forgot to go grocery shopping; there was barely any food in there. Eren took the egg carton and the nearly empty pack of bacon strips.
"Good. There are enough eggs for today," He said as he looked inside the egg carton, showing four eggs left. Eren placed them on the counter before opening his bread box and taking out two slices of white bread. He took out two pans, one for bacon and one for eggs.
Even though they were more expensive, he chose to get non-stick pans so he wouldn't have to waste time scraping off the remains of his food that could have been eaten. Eren got seasoning for his food and put on his red apron before he started to cook.
After he finished cooking, he placed the pans in the sink and walked to his black couch and got his laptop out so he can listen to music while eating. The bacon was crispy and dark red with the grease in the pan still making a crackling sound, and the eggs were a nice dark golden yellow with steam coming off of them, and the toast was gently buttered and golden brown.
He grew confident in his cooking, after all, he had to learn how to since he needed save as much money as possible. He remembered when he cooked for himself and his older sister, she would enjoy his cooking, even though she'd never admitted it, but he knew she liked it since every time there were leftovers, the next day they would be gone, sometimes he would get irritated but he couldn't help but to smile knowing that she was the one who ate it.
He began packing his stuff up, putting some of his clothes in a small black duffel bag before placing his laptop and charger in his red backpack. But before he left for good, he went underneath his bed and took out a red rectangular metal container and opened it, showing a sum of money. It was 2,000 Elds that he won last night, a picture of his younger self with his mother in front of his former grade school and a red USB Type-C key that had his mother's name on it.
It was one of the only things besides the picture and the chain that survived the fire. He put the container in his bag and looked around his place one more time. All the memories he shared here with his sister, in this district and in the underground, but he knew it was time. Time to live a better life.
"Well, it's time to go," Eren sighed, closing and locking his door. He went inside the elevator and pressed the button for the ground floor before he put on his red headphones to listen to hip-hop music. While on the elevator,
He thought of the dream that he had last night; it wasn't the first time he had a dream like that. Although he would have similar dreams, some things would remain constant, like the woman, the ships and the stars and then he would have dreams completely irrelevant, like being in a desert or having his legs eaten by a giant monster.
The elevator doors opened, and Eren was about to make his way out before being distracted by a light brown cat. He kneeled down and started petting it.
'He must be nearby, he's always around his cat,' He thought as he looked around to see if he was in the area before turning his attention back to the cat.
"Hey buddy, how are you doing?" Eren said as he started to pet the cat, "Has your owner given you breakfast? I won't be surprised if he had a bowl himself."
"There you are, buddy," A raspy voice said as the cat walked towards the source of the voice. Eren smelled the disgusting smell of tobacco and knew that it was him.
He turned around to see a fat middle-aged man walking out of the left hallway. He had a thick and unkempt ginger beard with blotchy pink skin and a receding hairline. His black tank top looked way too small, exposing nearly half of his big, hairy gut and red and white striped pants, but because of his size, they looked tight on his short, stumpy legs.
"You're pretty sneaky for someone your size. Have you been practicing?"He made fun of his physique.
"Where's the rent money?"The landlord asked in a serious tone, smoking a cigarette.
"I'll have it if I come back," Eren said as he stood up.
"If?"The landlord said, confused." What do you mean by 'if'?"
"I'm going to try out for the Adventurer's Program," Eren stated.
The landlord laughed before he started to have a series of heavy coughs.
'Jeez, put down the cigarettes, dude and then you wouldn't be coughing like that,' Eren thought.
"Listen kid, I'm going to be real with you, it ain't going to happen. How old are you now, boy? 16?17?You know how risky being an Adventurer is? In my opinion, you're just wasting money….money that should be going to me!"
Eren didn't want to hear it. He trained for this; he didn't spend years fighting, not only for a living, but for getting ready for this job, by training his body and his martial arts techniques,training his power just to give up and wait another year. He wanted to leave this place and travel the world as soon as possible, and joining the Adventurer Association is the quickest way to do it. All that fat man wanted was his money. Eren did have the money, but he wasn't going to give it to him. There was no point in paying since he wasn't going to be living here anymore.
"Yo, don't you have other people to bother? You have like 20 other tenants in this building, but you're chasing after me."
The landlord furrowed his thin red brows. "It's because you're always the last one to pay it!You should be surprised I didn't kick you out years ago!"
"Give me a break, I'm 15! You know how hard it is to find work?!"Eren told his landlord. "You should be wondering how I get the money to pay it off."
"I don't care about your methods! Shit, you could be selling your body for all I fucking care! Hand it over!"
"Fuck no!"Eren said before quickly heading to the front doors.
"You take a step outside this building, you can't come back,'' the fat man threatened, "And if you do, I will kill you."
Eren rolled his eyes. The landlord was only a regular human while he was a metahuman. He wouldn't stand a chance against them unless he was packed with a very strong weapon, but even then, he would still win.
Eren grinned with confidence. "I'll take my chances.Sayonara." He walked out of the apartment, hearing the landlord shouting behind him, but it didn't matter to him. Eren put back on his red headphones before he took out his phone; it wasn't big or small, but it did have a slight crack on it because it dropped out of his pocket while going to school.
Eren used the Transit app to know when the next bullet train to the Emrich District comes. But before that, he needed to see her, so he ran down from the northern half of Shiganshina to the southern half, swiftly dodging and jumping over people and obstacles, leaving people with a bunch of mixed reactions, from people being in awe to shouting curses in his direction, calling him 'a mutant' or 'a showoff'.
In a matter of 10 minutes, Eren was now a block away from the cemetery. He looked around the place where he was born and spent the beginning of his childhood, remembering the moments that he had been here. The park where he and his friends used to play basketball and hang out, the depanneur where he and his friends would get snacks, by paying for it, but sometimes it would be free because of a special "discount", Eren finally made it to the Shiganshina Cemetery.
The tall trees were surrounding the tombstones that were in different shapes that were in a variety of grey colors from near white to the color of charcoal.
He walked to the middle of the cemetery, showing four 6 feet black marble walls with one facing each direction. "Northern wall, second row, sixth unit," Eren said ,remembering his mother's location.
He took out the key out of his jacket pocket, unlocked the unit, and opened the door to take the silver urn that contained his mother. The urn was silver that had her name, her birth date, her death date, and a message engraved into it. Carla Katsuki, January 29, X810 - June 20, X843 and the message was: 'Daughter, Friend and Mother.'
He sat down on the closest old wooden bench. It was a little uncomfortable, but he didn't mind.
"So, it's been a while, huh? Three months, if I'm correct, "Eren started. He looked at the urn before he averted his eyes from it. "Sorry. With school and work, it was nearly impossible to visit. But today's the day. I'm going to try out to be an Adventurer. I know the test will be hard, and there will be many people years older than me and probably more experienced than me, but I'm ready for this. I know I am. I trained for this."
Eren sighed. "Knowing you, you probably wouldn't want me to be an Adventurer with all the risks and dangers like different types of dangerous monsters and unknown lands that people are too scared to enter. But…"
Eren lowered his head and closed his eyes, "I don't know how long I can keep living like this…doing these odd jobs, stealing things and all the school stuff I had to do…I want to live better for myself, travel around the world and see all the different places and cultures. Plus, if my sister makes it this year, I will be able to see her again, and we can explore the world...together."
Then, he felt a vibration in his pocket. He took out his phone to see that Floch was calling him. "Hey, what's up?"
"Yo, where are you, Eren?"
Eren glanced back at the silver urn."I'm just…visiting someone. What's up?"
"Well, you better hurry up cause it's starting in less than an hour."
"Yeah, I know, but I had to get something done before I go," Eren checked the time.
"Alright, hurry up,"Floch hung up.
He carefully picked up the urn and walked to the wall of lockers before gently placing the urn in the locker. "I'll see you later..Mom," Eren said before slowly closing the locker and locking it. He closed his eyes and remembered what happened to his mother, the fire, the hospital. He could even remember the sound of the vital machine flatlining, the long beep echoing in his mind. He felt his throat tighten as tears came down his cheeks.
"I'm sorry…I wanted you to talk a little longer, but I have to go…" Eren wiped the tears off his face before sprinting out of the cemetery. He slapped his cheeks to refocus. He can't grieve right now. He has somewhere to be.
Eren looked at a nearby building before he jumped and landed on the roof.He looked around to see a glimpse of a barber's pole two blocks away. Eren ran and jumped from building to building until he was on the roof of the shop.
Eren jumped off the roof and landed softly on the ground. When he opened the door, the frame hit the bell rang, signalling the barbers of a new customer.
"Well, well, well. If it isn't Eren, or should I say Inferno?" One of the barbers said jokingly as he began to spray alcohol on his clippers to disinfect them.
"What's up, D-Wrek?"
"Hey, I'm a barber now, not a DJ. Call me Derek, "The barber said with a chuckle.
"Just like you need to call me Eren. I'm a soon-to-be Adventurer, not a freelancer."
Derek was the barber that Eren would always go to when he needed a haircut. His shape-ups were always elite compared to the other ones here. Derek was a fairly tall man, standing at six feet with a lean build and dark skin, with his black coily hair styled in a neat mini-afro on his head. His eyes were a dark brown with a well-kept beard, wearing a simple black t-shirt, grey cargo pants and black running shoes.
"How's business?" Eren looked at the filled seats of customers. "With my eyes, it seems to be booming."
"Hell yeah, it is. Judging by your hair, I'm guessing you want a cut too?"Derek asked.
"Yeah, but before we get to that, you said you needed my help. So I am here to know the details but we have to make it quick. I'm in a time crunch because the Adventurer's Exam starts in under an hour."
"Oh shit, the exam is today? Don't worry, I just finished with this little homie right here, "He patted the short man with a fresh low fade.
"Little homie? Go fuck yourself, Derek," The short man said as he got off the black leather barber chair.
"Or what? You're gonna punch my knees?" Derek joked, making Eren chuckle and the other barbers laugh at him. The short man's face soured, took out his wallet and opened it to give Derek his money.
"Pleasure doing business with cha, Tommy," Derek said as he placed the money on his desk. Tommy stormed out of the barbershop before Derek rolled his eyes. "
What's up with him?" Eren asked.
"Don't worry about him. Tommy is like that all the time. He acts cold, but he has a good heart," Derek placed the clippers down on his desk. "Okay, let's head out, and I'll tell ya the info."
"Bet." The two males walked out of the shop and began to stroll around the block.
"So here's the issue. One of my homeboys got jumped last night and got his phones taken away. Now one of them is his personal but the other is his burner phone. He uses it to keep in contact with his dealer." Derek explained.
"What does he sell?" Eren asked.
"Only different types of cannabis, not that crazy shit. Luckily, he's a smart dude, so he planted a GPS in his burner. So your job is to track it down and retrieve the phones, preferably his burner phone. In case you need to differentiate, the burner is a very old flip phone, and his personal is a touch screen."
Derek explained. Eren nodded. "Alright, I got you, Derek."
"I knew I could rely on you. Now, I'll send you the location. After you get them, bring them back to me. Unfollowed. Oh yeah, take this," Derek gave him a small black remote with a small screen and only a white button.
"What's this?"
"A tracking device. When you get close enough, pressing the button will emit a sound to help you find it, got that?"
Eren put the remote in his jacket's inside pocket and gave his bags to Derek. "Okay, I'll see you later."
"Kick some ass for me, Eren!"
Eren gave his tall friend a grin. "You know I will!"
He started to jog to an alleyway and began to jump, from wall to wall, until he was back on top of a roof. He turned on the device. The screen flashed white before it went blue. There was a grid with blocks and strips of different sizes and lengths, representing the buildings and streets surrounding him. A blue arrow pointed east 12 km away from here. "Okay, let's head out!"
Eren continued to jump from roof to roof while doing different flips and spins in mid-air. He laughed as he felt the wind flow through his hair. Enjoying the parkour, he kept closing the distance between him and the destination until, within a span of a few minutes, he reached his destination. The signal was coming from an apartment building.
"Great, an apartment building…"Eren groaned. He hopped down and analyzed the front of the building through the ground-floor window. The building looked to be seven stories tall, with no secretary, so there would be no suspicion right away.
Two doors back-to-back in the entrance, meaning that the inner door was most likely locked. There were no security cameras, meaning that the security was poor.
Eren walked up the staircase and opened the front door to be in front of the inner door. He pulled the door to realize that the inner door wasn't even locked, granting him access inside.
"They need to fix that lock, "Eren said, looking for any camera, only to see none in sight but he wasn't convinced, so he looked around, but there were no cameras. "Kinda hard to hide any cameras in here, if there's barely any place to secretly hide it."
The entrance floor was minimalistic, with the walls being a mustard yellow with a sitting area with a few worn-out chairs on the left wall next to a pile of old magazines on a coffee table. The elevator was across from the door with a grey door leading to the staircase. He looked up to see that the elevator was on the fifth floor.
"Guess it's the staircase, then, "Eren said as he pushed open the door, leading to the staircase and quickly went up the stairs. He stopped near the door to the third floor and closed his eyes, putting more focus into his enhanced hearing, filtering out the surrounding noise.
He took out the remote and pressed the top button, making a ringing sound.
"What the hell?!That sound again?!"He heard a masculine voice complaining.
'It's coming from the fourth floor!' Eren concluded as he sprinted up to the fourth floor. He opened the door and carefully walked through the corridor as he went closer to the source.
Another voice sighed. "Finally, it's stopped. Where's Boris?! I need him to take back his fucking phone. I swear If it wasn't his, I would've shattered it!"
"What do we even need the phone for?"Another masculine voice said. "He couldn't get another one?"
"Who cares? We got it back, and now we need to just wait," A third male voice said.
'Three dudes? No biggie, I fought three men before, and they were metahumans,' Eren thought. 'But, they could be metahumans too. I guess I'll find out once I'm inside.'
He knew where the voice was coming from and walked quietly to the front of the door before he went into his bag and took out a black ski mask and a pair of red safety gloves before putting the mask on, covering most of his face except for his mouth and eyes.
"Okay, let's get the party started!"Eren said before putting on the gloves, taking a couple of steps back and kicking down the door, breaking it down and startling three men in dark clothing. Two of the men pulled out knives, while the other one in the middle pulled out a gun with a silencer at the end.
Eren quickly glanced at his surroundings. 'Guess they're not metahumans.'
The living room area has a loveseat and a black coffee table behind it with a television in the corner. On the right side led to the kitchen, and on the left was a small corridor leading to two rooms.
Eren dashed and did a dropkick on the man with the gun, making him drop the gun, making him fly over the couch and hit the wall with his body, slumped to the floor. The men with the knives were going to stab him, but he softly jumped and did a split kick in midair, sending both of them back. The man on his left leaned forward and thrust his knife at him, but Eren quickly dodged and grabbed his arm, doing a shoulder throw and sending him crashing down into the apartment below, making the female tenant below them scream.
"Sorry," He told her before he looked at the last man, slowly recovering from the force of his kick. Eren ran to him, but he pulled a gun out. 'He has a gun too?!' Eren thought before he jumped back.
The man shot two bullets at him before he got a quick flash of the future, showing the direction of the bullets.
'He's aiming for my head,' Eren smirked. 'No problem.'
He swiftly moved his head, dodging the incoming bullets as they went through the wall behind him.
He jumped over the hole and did a Webster axe kick, landing the blow on the back of the robber's head, sending him into the hole on the floor and creating a deeper hole three stories below where he was.
He slammed against the fridge, crashing through the wall into the apartment next to him and scaring an elderly couple in their living room.
"Sorry...again," Eren stood up before he walked into the kitchen and quickly looked around the now fucked up apartment to find the phones. He looked around to see the two phones on the counter, a touch screen and a flip phone.
He pressed the button to make sure that the old flip phone was the one he needed. It rang, confirming Eren's question before he quickly stuffed them in his bag. He jumped at the window, tucking his arms and legs in before breaking through and falling to ground level. He softened the impact by rolling and covering his head from a rain of glass falling above him.
Eren turned his head to see a silver car with people inside wearing dark clothing as well, just getting out of the car.
"Shit…"Eren muttered as the people who were in the car went back into the car. He started to run as the car chased him down.
"Gonna lose them!" Eren said as the car sped down to follow him, swerving around other vehicles and going past red lights. He was now slightly ahead of the car, giving him the opportunity to kick the blue van next that was next to him.
The silver car avoided the hurling car, but it crashed, smashing into a tree. He laughed as the car horn was blaring throughout the area.
"Sayonara, bitches!"Eren said as he continued to make his way back to the shop. He then sprinted, leaving a gust of wind behind him, affecting the pedestrians near him, causing them to get slightly pushed back, with some of the lighter ones briefly levitating before landing back down.
He ran to a nearby building and transferred his momentum from the sidewalk to a wall, making him climb the wall by simply running on it. When Eren was now on a roof once more,with the teen taking off the ski mask and enjoying the warm breeze brushing past his face and pushing his hair after a successful break in.
After a few minutes of parkour, Eren reached the barbershop and opened the door. The bell rang, getting Derek's attention as he was talking to his friend, who was cutting a kid's hair.
"You got it?"
Eren dug into his bag and tossed him the two phones and the remote. "You know it."
"Nice." Derek caught the phones and the remote, gently placed them down on his desk.
"Now, the seat is ready for you, my friend."
Eren shook his head, "Not yet, I want to make my next haircut special when I pass the exam."
"Okay, I got you. Break a leg on the exam, alright?" Eren grinned as he gently hit his right fist against his chest.
"Here's the payment for getting the phones, "Derek gave the teen 500 Eldrens.
"Half a grand?! Derek, you're joking, right?!"
Derek crossed his arms as he leaned on his barber counter, "You deserve it. You did it quickly and efficiently. You improved a lot since the first time you did an odd job with your friends. Speaking of your friends, have you talked with them recently?"
Eren looked down before slowly shaking his head.
Derek sighed. "Well, as long as it doesn't link to me, you or my friends, we should be fine. Wait, they didn't see your face, did you?"
"No, I was wearing a ski mask, plus I had gloves on." "
Okay, well then we have nothing to worry about." Eren was about to leave until he turned and grinned.
"See ya, Derek!" "See ya, man! Knock it out of the park for me!" Eren lifted a thumb.
"I got you! Don't worry!" He looked at his phone to see that the train was coming in a couple of minutes.
"Shit, I have to go quickly!"Eren said as he ran to the train station.