“Yes mom, I got the package. Please thank Wela for me. Also, did you know she was holding onto this super cool picture book? I don’t remember seeing it before, or hearing about it.” It was just after 9 am and Krystofer had been woken up by his mother calling. “Huh, no. She gave you a picture book? I’ll have to ask her about it. Did she send you anything else?” His mom was asking on the other line. Krys chuckled, “I got a card like always, the picture book and this cool bag with blank cards in it.” He answered.

Patricia Garcia was silent for a few moments before she answered. “Your grandmother is worrying me mijo. She’s been cleaning out her attic a lot lately… and she keeps talking about selling her house. She wants to downgrade. I guess I should go pay her a visit actually. Did you like the card?” She ended up asking. “Yes mom.” He said again. “You know I always do, grandma always sends really good ones, just like you. And I didn’t know she was doing that… I hope she is alright too. But don’t worry too much, Wela has always been strong.” He added. “I just wonder what the cards are for… and if there is any history about the book I should know. Both things seem in really good condition, but I get the feeling they are pretty old.” There was a “tsk” on the other line. “Hold on, Im texting her now.”

The sun was intruding a bit too much between a window so while he was waiting on the phone he got out of bed and went over to adjust the curtain. He rolled his eyes listening to his mom sound distracted. She always did this, call him and then make him wait. He started chuckling. “What’s so funny?” “Nothing.” He cleared his throat while heading into his attached bathroom, where he began to brush his teeth, putting his mom on speaker. “Oh! She answered. She says… the book was given to her by her father when she first left Puerto Rico and moved to New York City. The cards were for some ‘game’ that he used to talk about but she never played, only listened to him talk about it some. She said that he used to explain that there wasn’t a way to play anymore.”

That’s interesting. Back in his bedroom, Krys started to pick out an outfit for the day. “Hm. Did she say anything else?” He asked sort of absentmindedly. “Um, no, oh wait, just that the cards and the book have always been kept together.” “Oh.” Krys had a black polo shirt on and was changing into a pair of green colored pants. He had one leg in and the other raised up, his phone resting on a shelf in his armoire while he craned hisneck to look over at where the book and velvet bag were lying together on his desk. “Krystofer. Krystofer. Hello? Can you hear me?” His mom was asking. “Oh, huh? Yes! Sorry.”

“I am going to go now, your sister just got here, she says ‘Hi’ by the way.” “Oh okay, tell her I say hi back. Bye.” “Good-bye, I love you.” “Love you too.” The phone beeped and went silent. Krys glanced in the body mirror attached to the inside of his armoire door, straightening his shirt a bit and turning to make sure everything looked even and hopefully flattering before he turned fully away and walked over to his desk. Looking down at the book and bag. Always together, huh? He flipped a few pages of the book again, his breath caught on a particular one. It appeared to be a beautiful city down from a birds-eye-view. The entire city was surrounded by a wide stone wall, perfectly round. The viewpoint was from so high up there were rows upon rows of circular clouds as if the heavens themselves were singling out the city below. He was starting to lean closer, contemplating sitting down in his chair to start skipping through the pages again when suddenly his stomach let out a puny, pleading noise. A whimper more than a growl. Krys couldn’t help but laugh as he turned right around and left his room, heading downstairs to the kitchen.

He found there was a mini spread left out along the counter with a few choice breakfast options. Scrambled eggs, toast, and a few pieces of cooling bacon were put on a plate before he went over to the long dining table. He saw Dylan O’Mackley and Melanie Holtz already there, though Dylan looked like he was almost done with his makeshift scrambled eggs sandwich. Melanie probably had just sat down. She smiled sweetly before starting to eat. It looked like she had poached herself some eggs and toasted an English muffin. Krys sat and offered Mel a nod of thanks, assuming correctly that she had cooked breakfast for everyone. He ate quickly and quietly until Dylan finished and left. That was when Melanie quietly cleared her throat and said, “Are you friends with Logan?” Krys started to prematurely swallow at the unexpected question, causing him to almost choke before he recouped. He finished chewing and then swallowed before answering. “Uh, not really, why? I know him but we really only spoke for the first time yesterday.” He said. To his amazement, Mel seemed a bit disappointed. “Oh, I see. Sorry for asking. He is somewhat of a childhood friend of mine, we aren’t super close or anything but I know he could use some friends around here. He seemed pretty ‘buddy-buddy’ with you last night so I just thought maybe…” She shrugged before forcefully ending her spoken out-loud thought process. Krys grinned. “Oh, well, he seemed friendly enough. I figured he was sort of, y’know, ‘too-cool for school’ kind of a guy. I guess I should have learned to stop judging a book by its cover after high school though. Now I feel like the bad guy.” He said.

Melanie started laughing at that. “Oh. Yeah, no. He gets that assumption a lot, I think. But, every time I have ever been around him he has only ever been a friendly person to hang with. Not that I have that much. We haven’t really had a matching schedule so I haven’t been able to welcome him yet. If and when I do, I’ll make sure he knows your a good guy too.” She said, a twinkle of humor left over in her eyes. Then she stood with her empty plate and went to the kitchen before leaving. That was… unexpected. He thought afterwards. Then his mind wandered to Logan which was a bad idea because he thought of the shoulder bump and the grin and then the dropped towel and the other guys physique. Krys shut his eyes hard and made himself think of something else, anything else. You’re just jealous. He finished his last few bites and brought the plate to the dishwasher before heading straight up to his room.

He kept his head down as he passed anyone in the halls to his room, he didn’t want to see anyone, talk to anyone… and he didn’t want anyone to look or talk to him just yet. He sped into his room and shut the door. Leaning against it as his heart raced a bit, he couldn’t deny that Logan was attractive… but neither was Melanie. Melanie had been the one he had his eyes on this entire trimester and now she had spoken with him… she had been super sweet to him. But… she only spoke to him to ask about her older friend? The friend that he had had an awkward encounter with as their first meeting…. Oh vey.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

A distraction. Yes. That was what he needed. His eyes went back to his desk. One side he had his class assignment, school books etc. stacked up, and on the other was his birthday present, the picture book and bag of blank cards. He paused for a moment as he settled on what to do. There was only a bit more of his essay so he sat down and got to it. He was engrossed within moments, luckily it was a theory assignment based off of a book they had read earlier in the curriculum. It was a story he had plenty of opinion about so he found the essay easy to get into. Time passed before there was a knock at the door, interrupting his thoughts and getting him to turn around to face his door. Dylan was walking in again, with a few envelopes of mail and one surprisingly large at that. “These are for you.” Said the juggernaut who tossed them on the bed before walking out. Curious, Krys got up and moved to his bed to tear open all the mail. Four envelopes altogether, including the larger one. The regular sized ones turned out to be birthday cards, one from his parents, one from his sister and the last from his high school friend who had ended up multiple states over at a different college. His friend, Brian had went to an IT school, the stupid super smart nerd that he was. Krys couldn’t help but chuckle at the thought of his closest friend, then his eyes danced over to the last parcel. He ripped open the orangey brown envelope and turned it on its side to slide out its contents. Falling out, onto the bed covers was a small hand mirror, a long white feather, a few packets of planting seeds, a tiny travel-sized bottle of something and a handwritten letter.

He snatched up the letter and read:

“I know how much you’ve always liked watching the birds, so I figured a feather might be something weird, yet neat to collect. The seeds are so you can plant them, of course. I know you love having plants around so I figure you could work for it down there. The mirror was our sisters idea, she said you need to be reminded how… ‘handsome’ you are. Don’t get any ideas though, you know I’ll always be the champ of good looks in this family. Oh and the last thing is from good ol’ me, because well, when you spend so much time alone, I figured it was the best present I could add.

- Your brother Tae.”

Krystofer smiled as he read his brother's thoughtful letter. Each of the words echoed in his mind, and he could almost hear his brother’s mischievous tone. Looking over at the bottle he found sure enough… it was not something he wanted to ever be caught with. He snatched it up and went to his bathroom, putting it deep inside a drawer of his vanity, planning to never let it see the light of day again. He turned back to his room, grabbed the rest of the things that were part of his brother’s gift and brought them to his desk. He arranged the feather at the top edge of the desk and left the three packets of seeds next to it before deciding where to put the mirror. He was holding it slightly to his left where he could see back towards his bedroom door with it. That’s when he noticed the door had been left open and in that precise moment someone appeared at it.

Turning around with big eyes, Krystofer and Logan just stared at each other for a moment before the latter finally spoke. “Uh, good mornin’.” He said. Krys held his breath, he didn’t know what to say for some reason. He was more thrown off about Logan’s presence than he would have expected. “Could I come in?” Logan asked. Krys just nodded dumbly before he remembered to breathe. He sputtered for a second. “Uh… yeah, sure, come in.” He managed and swallowed nothing. “What’s up?” The other guy seemed slightly reluctant before he steeled himself. “Sorry to bother you but, all the bathrooms are taken. Do you think I could use your’s again?” Oh. Krys just smirked. “Fine, whatever.” He said, waving a hand. “You know where it is.” He said, not really thinking his words through. Logan winced before nodding and heading into the private restroom, closing the door behind him.

Krys got up immediately after, went and closed his bedroom door and then went back to the desk. He couldn’t decide on how he wanted to arrange his desk so he ended up putting the mirror, feather and seed packets all together off to the side for now. Accidentally, he knocked over the velvet bag, causing a few of the cards to spill out, one landed on top of the still open picture book. And suddenly everything changed.

❧

It happened in the blink of an eye. The world seemed to turn to ink around him and simply dissolve away in a multitude of colors. Now he was falling down through a cloud filled sky. He was screaming, but no one could hear him, he couldn’t even hear himself as the wind tore his breath away. He felt his hair flapping wildly. His entire body felt numb as the temperature soaked in and took the heat straight out of him. He dared to look down, seeing land, trees, water in the distance, and a what appeared to be a round, walled city straight down. Before he could even attempt to comprehend where he was or what was happening though his vision became dominated by what appeared to be a messaged screen in his minds eye. Or was it actually in front of his face? He couldn’t be sure.

Welcome!

Welcome to the World of Ulom.

Senior System Token Accepted.

…

Initializing Integration.

…

Foreign Items Converted for additional Customization Credits.

…

State your name.

Krys just stared in horror as he felt his body plummeting down to the earth. He didn’t say anything, although he managed to shut his mouth and cut off his own mindless screaming. His throat was already hurting, scratching as he tried to swallow. He turned his body so that he was falling with his back faced down and his eyes upward. The screen seemed to move with his vision. Almost flashing with impatience.

State your name.

It prompted again. Krys finally started to blurt out his name… “Kyr-“ he had misspoke thanks to the unrelenting winds but he watched as the screen took what he started to say and began to spell it out. Quickly he made a snap judgement, unsure what exactly was going on, maybe giving a false name was the smarter way to go. Nah… he was talking to a disembodied screen… ugh, whatever. “Krystofer Garcia”.

Thank you, Krystofer.

Please answer the following question: If you could choose between fighting darkness directly or shielding others from it, which path would you decide upon?

“What?! There isn’t time for—“

Please answer the question.

The message prompted with another flash. This was absolutely nuts. He was falling to his death… ugh… “Im not really a fighter, so I would try to help others before going onto the front lines, I think.” He spoke into the air, his words quickly snatched away.

Thank you, Krystofer.

Your answer has been registered.

Senior System Tokens Detected.

Analysis Complete.

Customization Confirmed.

…

Class Confirmed.

Establishing Unique Status.

Establishing Tier.

…

Establishing Unique Token Deck.

…

Conversion Successful.

Ability One: Confirmed.

Ability Two: Confirmed.

Affinity Acquired: Air.

Ability Three: Confirmed.

Hybrid Ability: Confirmed.

Affinity Acquired: Light

Ability Three: Altered to Hybrid Ability Two.

Race: Evolution Confirmed and Successful.

Racial Perks Confirmed.

Class Perks Confirmed.

…

The words were moving so quickly, he was surprised he kept up, but then he saw from the corner of his eyes the tip of a tree… he was about to hit the ground! His eyes slammed shut.