Flitting through the deeper alleyways of the Vent Slums, Jak left the Back Market quickly behind. Late evening had fallen over the city by now and the Amber lights reflected this as they cast their dim, twilight shine onto the murky walls and pipes below.

Hurrying through the twisting and turning hallways of the slums, Jak soon enough arrived at his destination and after a quick look around ducked into a shadow cast side alley. It was a dead end with even the massive steam pipe long since forgotten, thick rust and moss having grown over it throughout the years. A small but rare, forgotten section of the massive steam engine of Dampfstadt.

Looking back and forth, Jak made sure that nobody was following him, before scurrying behind the ancient pipe. The rust there had crumbled to dust and opened up into the pipe itself, the insides were surprisingly smooth and untouched by the outside decay. Jumping inside, Jak slid down the unintentional slide into the bowels of the city.

A few minutes later he came to a halt and had to crawl forward as the pipe evened out again. It was a bit of a maze from here on out but Jak had made his way through here so often by now that he could have reached the end even without the dim Amber shine leading his way in the distance.

One left, twice right, onwards for a while and finally after another left turn the side of the pipe ripped open as if a massive claw or blade or similar had slashed across the metal. The sharp edges had been covered in cloth and Jak easily and safely squeezed himself through and into his home.

It was an old maintenance quarter for the plumbers that must have been locked down decades ago and nobody had bothered to check on it since. And now Jak had claimed it as his own.

“Uah…!” Stretching himself wide with a loud yawn, Jak wandered over to the small, make-shift bed. Multiple blankets thrown over an old mattress, occasionally he hung them up to use as a hammock. Today he didn’t bother and just slipped right under the sheets as he turned down the Amber light inside to a similar twilight gleam dominating the slums above. Shoes and clothes peeled off of him and landed randomly in a corner.

And a few minutes later he was fast asleep. It was startlingly quiet here below, only the sound of his snores and the rhythmic ticking of his clock filled the air.

———

School was a point of fact that even Jak couldn’t escape. And so the alarm clock echoed loudly through his little hideout early the next morning, waking him roughly from his sleep. Jak wasn’t the only one woken up by the waking call, however.

An entire bunch of Rust Slimes had snuggled up against him sometimes during the night and were now bouncing alarmed atop of him. Rust red platings clinking lightly atop their backs as their brown and red bodies wiggled about. They looked like flat ovals of squishy flesh covered in pieces of rather unimpressive armour, big round eyes looking around wide eyed. And they were cute as they were useful.

Rust Slimes were part of the Numeryuu family, a type of mollusk, that had adapted to eat a variety of stuff. Rust Slimes, as the name implied, ate primarily rust and kept the steam pipes of Dampfstadt clean.

No matter how cute or useful they were, though, having an entire bunch of them bouncing on your like hyperactive grapes didn’t really endear them to the person being jumped on.

“Oh, come on! I told you not to come in here…!” Jak groaned out with a wide yawn, his eyes still small and beady from the rude awakening. Grabbing the edges of his blanket, he quickly swiped it upwards and caught most of them in his make-shift trap that he promptly tied up tight. “You’re staying in there until after I’m done washing up.” He glared lightly, another yawn escaping him as he rubbed his still sleepy eyes and stumbled awkwardly towards a still adequately functioning bathroom.

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A few minutes later Jak came back with his face still somewhat wet, jumping on one leg as he pulled up his pants while blindly slipping into his shirt. The fact that he managed to do all of this while also carrying his school bag was honestly impressive.

“Let’s see… today we have…?” He mumbled absentmindedly as he checked what today’s lesson plan was.

The temporary bag of Rust Slimes wiggled unnoticed, and ignored by Jak, to the side. With a silent plop, one of the smaller Numeryuus had managed to free itself and was now looking a bit dazed before quickly shaking itself to recover near instantly.

It regarded Jak curiously, the Rust Slimes were already used to young Gaian though not his scary noisemaker, before bouncing towards the large thingie he was putting stuff into. Maybe there was food inside?! And with bright sparkling eyes the small slime jumped into the bag, vanishing among all the school stuff. There was even enough rust dust from Jak’s climbing about that it actually did find some food!

“Okay! Time to get going…!” Jak grinned, hoisting the bag onto his back with the blind passenger entirely unnoticed.

“Oh, right… sorry, I nearly completely forgot about you…” The wolf cat apologised sheepishly as he noticed the still wiggling bag of Numeryuus and carefully opened it back up, releasing them. “Here you go, just remember the bed’s off limits next time.” He chuckled as they rolled and wobbled out of the blanket.

A few did seem to get the message, while the younger ones seemed to bounce around oblivious and cheerful. All of them, however, quickly moved back into the pipings to find some early morning rust to snack on.

Jak also had to get going, for his school was actually quite a ways away and he would rather not be late.

Since he had moved into this hideout, Jak had made sure to keep his options open to get the dodge out of here. Even if the Pipe Maintainers were to patch up his normal path, or he grew too big should puberty decide to still hit him hard after all, he still had three other ways to enter or leave through. More actually, but a few of them were just far too much of a pain in the ass for him to ever repeat. Just the thought alone… he shuddered and pushed the memories away immediately.

Which was the reason why he still preferred to just leave through the unused piping system.

School bag slung over his back, Jak squeezed himself through the tear and crawled further into the maze.

Dampfstadt had a rather interesting school system that had been pushed for by the late erz-mayor of about five decades ago. It was called the Open School System. Anyone, any person no matter age or origin, could enter any school and learn. Then they had to take an official test to prove their knowledge until graduation, these tests took place five times a year and could be taken as many times as you wanted. Of course, even with this system there were still schools that were simply better and those didn’t have limitless capacity. And so, the best schools were located in places that were rather difficult to reach for the common person. What? It wasn’t their fault that they didn’t have access to the elevator or the special bus or whatever excuse they had come up with.

That said, they also couldn’t just throw someone out when they actually managed to sneak in. As the current erz-mayor had famously declared in unofficial capacity: “If they manage to get in, then they absolutely deserve the best education they can get.” A smarmy smirk on his face.

Like, for example, knowing how to crack an Amber Matrix Lock at the inside of a maintenance vent to arduously climb up the piping of the artificial plateau where the best school of Dampfstadt was located. While all the other students got to take the TelePad or elevator, completely skipping all the climbing.

“At least it’s starting to get easier…” Jak ground out between pants. He could definitely feel his muscles getting a workout every school day, the reason why he actually slept about three days of the week somewhere within the school itself. Dodging the guards was always an adventure and he was pretty sure he had inspired some ghostly rumours. The amusement sadly was not enough to repay for his aching body as he heaved himself up and over the last edge.

“Ugh, finally…!” He gasped, rolling onto his back and breathing heavily. Eyes wide as he stared up at the piping metal. Just… a second… of rest. Then he would go, join the other students at school.