Narice feels something maleable within his fingers. A warm sun can be felt. The sound of a caw and the gentle ebb and flow of waves resounds in his ears. 

For the first time in a long time- he no longer feels the rocking of the ocean. Instead he feels the solidity of earth and a a light poking from a finger.

Beneath his eyelids he can sense light.

He looks up. At first- a blue sky and birds. From his peripherals, people. A little girl stands directly next to him- it seems the poking has come from her. Many people are behind and around her- pointing and whispering in his direction. As he moves the girl steps back in fright.

He doesn't give their stares much mind- Instead he looked behind him. The remnants of his broken up boat are scattered in the distance across an oceanside.

He must have washed up on the human’s mainland; but where? And if it were true about being sent to the future then when?

He steps up, he feels pain course throughout his body- however: he remembers everything.

—

The people looked somewhat startled as he gets up.

“Eo nie ep maiglr,” he hears a woman say to a man. Everything sounds like gibberish. The man followed her words and left the crowd.

Amidst the whispers, he noticed the man comes back with someone dressed in a blue uniform- an authority figure of some sort.

—

“Aerh!”

The uniformed man says as he boldly walks up to Narice. Narice doesn't understand- but the hand motions are another sign of language- He wants Narice to stay put. From his back -the man pulls out a shiny silver bracelet. As he approached Narice slowly with his hands out.

“K’atra pkg ong aokw plag air,” he spoke.

Narice understood nothing of what he said except the name K'atra but from the last experience he'd had with that man- he'd lost everything except the clothes on his back. From the looks of it- the man's eyes have a slight glow- having the influence by magic.

Narice made a run for it. He couldn’t tell what the uniformed man was saying, but he wasn't about to find out.

His whole body ached as he ran- but he still was able to gain some ground on the man when he’d unexpectedly jolted. Not to mention the policeman looked somewhat fat- and hadn’t been prepared for a footrace. 

The man gave up running quickly after Narice started began; instead he heard the man speak on a device attached to his chest as he pulled away.

As he ran he noticed stares coming from people. Soon enough his bare feet touched a flat rocky surface. Having been in the sun, it was warm on his feet. He looked ahead and saw a giant metal beast -It moved towards him at breakneck speeds.

He dodged out of the way with a jump- and looked at where the beast headed behind him. He noticed another metal beast in a different color- coming in the opposite direction towards him.

He tried his best to dodge this- but it was too close for him to properly react. Narice watched expecting to be eaten- but instead of hitting him it swerved to the side colliding with a metal pole of some sort. Narice was surprised as a human came out of the beast.

“Eot, wera!” he hears as the human looked from the smoking beast to him- exasperated. Narice didn’t want to hang around anymore. He waved back with an apologetic smile and ran towards a path with a lot of people walking.

He darted in and out of crowds while the individuals looks at him strangely. H pushed through and kept running. Thankfully, by walking in between people along their footpath - he was somehow protected by the metal beasts.

He hugged a bit closer to the wall just in case. The wall however- seemed to be a black sort of mirror- as he could see his reflection inside of it. He looked upwards to see how highly the glass rose and literally fell down on his butt in shock. He couldn't see the top! What sort of demonic magic could make such gigantic structures? The buildings were so big that they seemed to reach the clouds.

People looked at him strangely again- so he brushed himself off and tried to copy the other walkers. Even still - he wanted to stay safe so he stuck close to the buildings. As he walked he began to study the walkway. For some reason, the walkway was elevated a few inches above other ground. He noticed yellow and white lines that separating the path the metal beasts were on. Perhaps the paint was a magical spell that kept the beasts from crossing it.

As the crowds rushed by him- he heard a loud ‘wee-ooh’ sound coming towards him and growing quite loudly. He couldn’t tell where it was coming from- but if it was after him - he would certainly have to hide. He looked ahead and noticed a break in the wall- so he dove into it.

The 'wee-ooh' sound passed him and then disappeared. He sighed out relief.

Humans... the Aqayans from his village looked down on them as weak. He'd been told that humans lacked magic- and couldn't survive without supporting each other- but he'd only just begun to explore the human world- and already he'd seen enough for his entire world view to change. What else were the teachers wrong about? 

His humanity teacher had taught him a bit about science. Supposedly humans used a weird power called 'electricity' which was similar to magic. While they were limited only to science- he wondered how much of a limit that actually set on them.

He remembered how much pride the Aqayans had as the greatest race and yet none of the architecture in the village compared to the humans'.

With it -they built structures a hundred times bigger than any Aqayan building, metal beasts that seemed to travel very fast, great roads that stretched as far as the eye could see... He looked at the individual humans and he started to notice more details about them. A lot of them seemed to be talking to noone. Others seemed to be holding some sort of rectangular device to their ears or in front of them.

His clan had never told him about any of this in school. He knew his father had seen this before- maybe that's why his father had a different outlook then the rest of his village. His father didn't underestimate humanity, even if the rest of the Aqayans thought nothing of them. Having been partially raised by a human- he knew they were capable of love and kindness- what else could they be capable of?

His tried to calm down and rationalize his thoughts as he took a look around. More importantly…what now? He had no idea how he was supposed to live.

He seemed to be in some sort of path made between two buildings. He started walking further into it. 

His stomach emphasized his point with a growl- and he realized that he was very hungry. Perhaps he could trade some sort of work for food, but as it was he saw no vendors or huts, no smoke from ovens. where could he find something to eat? he figured he'd walk to the light on the other side.

As he walked he tried thinking of ways to get food. Maybe he would go fishing at night- once he could sneak back onto the beach. He could perhaps make a makeshift spear of sorts. He thought more about it. Humans had to eat too, right? All these people had to eat somewhere… was there some science that stopped them from eating?

As he was thinking about the strange possibilties, he heard a scream and forgot everything.

He raced towards where the scream had come. it was somewhere in a deeper part of one of the connecting walkways.  As he appraoched, he noticed a girl backed into the wall- and three guys surrounding her~ He could feel they had ill intent. the other two were approaching the girl while the third man stood in the back- holding a knife and a smirk along his face. Despite not being familiar with human culture, it was obvious they meant something bad.

He walked towards the group and spoke up, “Let her go.”

“On gel drf?” a man held out a small blade to him that had been held towards the girl. Narice almost wanted to laugh. Was that a kitchen tool or something? He though he may have seen a blade that small while his mom was cooking food. Compared to a sword- it was really just too small!

They seemed slightly confused when they saw Narice chuckling~ but they shifted their tone when he got serious again “Let. Her. Go!” Whether or not they could understand his words meant little- he was sure that they could understand his intent.

The other three who had surrounded the girl also turned and joined the one with a knife to attack Narice as he grabbed their attention.

“Oh- so it’s a fight you want…”

For once, Narice finally had the chance to do something he was familiar with.

The human with a knife responded, “og enak g en-!”

Whatever he was about to say was left unfinished as his mouth had been closed after Narice kicked his jaw in.

Another of the four opened his own mouth, “eng a-!”

Narice took advantage of the fact that he’d made the first moved. They hadn’t expected it and they were already one person less for a moment. He took the kick and kicked the next person's jaw. It was a fight, not talking, that they’d asked for.

The next two took a stance a bit a ways from him. One behind, one in front.

The other one pulled out a metal object with an opening at the end from behind his back.

Narice pondered what the object was for a moment until he saw the man point it at him, “A metal thing with a point is a…” he tried to remember one of his father’s lessons, “…gun?”

Narice moved as quickly as possible to the side as a large sound came from the tip. He shifted quickly as the man pulled the ‘clicker’- and then raced quickly towards the man, remembering what his father taught him about guns ‘lower your distance and ‘guns’ will lose their advantage .

Narice kneed him in the stomach and the man and his gun dropped to the ground. The man still stood even though he'd been hit, he threw out a punch which Narice easily dodged, moved inside, and then threw a punch, then chopped his neck.

The other had picked up the knife. He was attempting to threaten him but exposed his fear as he yelled at Narice. His hands were shaking. Unlike his father, the man had no idea how to hold the ‘knife’. As the man swung out – Narice pushed the arm away while shifting inside with footing.The man’s metal toy dropped to the ground. By the time man had time to respond- Narice had already followed up by picking up the knife curiously… 

While it wasn't a sword, he was still familiar with the point of a blade.

Unlike the men also, he could use it much better. After testing its weight- spinning the knife around in his hand and testing it with some arm movements. He took up a proper stance and looked at the man.

The man wanted nothing to do with  Narice after seeing the skill he had with the blade. Instead he ran and tripped over another. 

The others, upon realizing that they didn't have much of a chance. all quickly followed behind- Stumbling as they ran. Rather than chase – Narice just watched on before turning his attention to the girl. She seemed a little worse for wear. As he approached her- a scared look showed on her face as she started to back away once again.

Oh. He was still holding onto the knife. Perhaps it would be a good tool for gutting fish- he though while looking at it for a second, considering how he would eat his next meal. It only took a split second for him to throw it back behind him- however.

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“-How...” he stopped himself mid-sentence realizing that she wouldn’t understand him speak. So he tilted his head as he looked at her questioningly, pointing and trying his best to gesture if she was okay.

Upon noticing that the strange character wasn’t about to hurt her, the girl finally began to cry.

He wasn’t really sure how to handle a crying girl… he had a little sister- and in that case he would just hold her and tell her it’ll be ok… In this situation... he decided to sit down for a moment, and she grabbed onto him instead. It wasn't really anything romantic. He was only twelve- she was probably eighteen to twenty.

He waited for a minute as she gathered herself together. He then gave her his hand for her to hold onto and pick herself up.

She grabbed the hand and gave him a show of gratitude with her smile. As she took his hand- suddenly his stomach began to rumble, at such an intense moment, his stomach actually acting like this. Narice looked down for a moment.

The distraction seemed to lift her spirits – Her eyes lighted with understanding… she took him by the hand and started to pull at him to follow. She walked him out of the alley back onto the noisy large road he’d just come from.

Narice watched her steps carefully. She seemed to have quite a grasp at walking along the paths. She walked along right part of the elevated path along the road and didn’t hit a person. He did the same. She stood at a metal pole with white lines that crossed horizontally in two direction. She touched a metal button and waited. As a picture on an opposite magic pole turned from a red hand to a white person, all the large metal objects stopped!

They crossed the white lines in the street.he saw that as it turned red again, the cars started to move. If it wasn’t magic, it was even more powerful.

They crossed a few different paths until they reached a door. A sign jutted outward of the door, “AERD NEFL.”

She pointed at the sign and then motioned for him to follow another way.

They walked around an alleyway and knocked on a door from behind.

“Aerkc,” she spoke.

They walked inside. Narice saw all sorts of silver things around him, it was shiny and bright, some sort of lights were scattered above him.

It seemed many gathered for prepping.... food!

Narice looked at all the different things being made.

“Aenfdk thas,” she spoke. 

“asdn Suzanne,” one of the men cooking replied.

She motioned to the food, “Aslknf owen bogkn w;lkr asd kjgl, lfng owper an.”

“aslkdn flkmnsd l;knweknf.”

From the back room they were in, she led him through a strange curtain- broken into four strips. In the proceeding room- he saw strange furniture scattered around an open room with people staring at them strangely.

“igq,” she said.

She pointed to one of the seats and he proceeded to sit on it like the humans.

He wasn’t sure what to do as she ran to the back room.

She gave him some water inside of a strange holder. He looked around at the people seeing them drink from it. She gave him another beverage beside it. It smelled like a fruit. He tasted it, and it was definitely juice. She gave him one more, but it smelled rancid. It had steam coming out of the cup and it held a curved handle. After looking at her questioningly, she nodded for him to drink.

He tried it- it was very bitter, and he made a strange face which she laughed at.

—-

She sat down with him for a minute.

“q;lk ot…” she spoke. Narice nodded, thinking it was an appropriate time to do so, unsure of what she said.

Food came out from the back room and was set down in front of him. He wasn’t sure, but some of it looked like it had come from pigs, more was some sort of pan made bread, and more still was eggs.

He watched her as she grabbed a flat cloth and put it on her lap. He tried to do the same and realized there were some metal artifacts inside of it that fell onto the table. One of them was rounded at the end, one had three small points, and one was a knife.

He tried his best to follow what she did with the objects. On her flat puffy bread she poured a liquid from a jar onto it and used a knife to spread what seemed to be a square solid butter

He did the same on his.

She looked at him strangely as he did however.

The meat it seemed- she used her hands to eat. He was grateful for that, and ate that first. He noticed her using the metal object with three points and the knife together. He was quite impressed.

He tried to do the same, however, trying to use both at once was quite difficult, so he took his knife and cut the flat bread into pieces with both hands.

He held the pointy thing and tried to copy what she did. He held it in a fist and stabbed the bread, managing to get five of the pieces he’d cut. He was quite proud.

They started eating together. He felt a fresh invigoration that came from the food. He felt like it was the most delicious thing he’d eaten since he could remember.

“This food is delicious,” he said with his mouth full. He’d gotten through two round flat cakes covered in some sort of sweet liquid and yellow fatty square- and was working on more.

“oare emi ao ne parkesn omgwa?”

“Uh,” forgetting that there was a language barrier, “sorry… thanks for the food.”

“sone godk al d neog?”

He’d go with it, “sone godk al d neog?”

She looked at him with her head tilted. After a few more minutes, she spoke again.

“one tlk nef ald ti a nf ,” she said looking at him work down a fourth, most likely commenting on the amount of food he’d eaten.

“asdflk ma,” she said while getting up. Narice watched as the girl walked into a different room.

Narice suddenly felt full. He’d finished his eighth pancake. Where could he sleep? He wondered.

He leaned back in the seat relaxing, content.

He waited there a few minutes, wondering where the girl had gone- for some reason, she’d seemed a little worried looking at him. He wish he could have asked her why. He self-reflected. He probably was a bit out of the ordinary, he hadn’t bathed in a bit, his hair was straggly, his clothes were strange too- not to mention ragged and torn.

Perhaps she thought he was a wanderer of some sort. He wish he could explain it, but seeing as he couldn’t speak her language- he figured he may try to ask for a place to sleep then be off on his way.

From behind him he felt some cold metal circles click on his wrists.

He tried to pull his hands apart, but they were tied to each other with a powerful spell. He turned his head to see a man dressed in a blue uniform with a black belt and other strange objects, similar to the one who had chased him earlier.

He spoke some words to Narice that he couldn’t understand.

They started dragging him away despite him trying pull him apart. These bracelets were tough.

The girl looked from the side of the room- motioning to the man in a blue uniform- It seems she was concerned for Narice in the method the blue suited man had used to capture him.

He looked at her, hurt by the current events.

“apn ogken…” she said sympathetically to him while he turned back towards the door.

Two men in blue dragged him out of the building with a lot of effort.

—

“Ad,” the officer spoke after he’d been dragged into a building and placed in a seat. “Ne oa neg kdg ane glde md.”

Narice looked at the officer with his arms crossed.

“Dln ge al ngt havn lrksn aglk?” he pointed to Narice. He put on a circular device on his throat,

“My name is Roka. What’s your name?”

Somehow this man understood him.

“Narice…” he said.

It seemed that a very strange magic indeed worked here.

—

“How do you communicate with me?” Narice asked.

“We have devices that allow us to communicate to the Ancient race. Otherwise it can’t be spoken by us.”

Narice kept up the charade of not knowing his past.

“Ancient?” Narice asked.

“I’m not sure what you call it- but that’s what we believe you are. Ka’atra told us there would be one showing up on the beach four years ago. We didn’t know why he’d predict this, but who can understand the power of Ka’atra,” he replied. “For the time being, I’m going to give you one. Although you’ll have to learn how to speak our language.”

Narice wondered why the officer would help him rather than flat out kill or imprison him, if he were working for Ka’atra after all.

Regardless, if they were working for Ka’atra, he still felt that he should feint ignorance to his past.

He took the translator that the officer handed him slowly. The officer watched him put it on and then nodded.

“We have a home set up for you,” The officer spoke. “Perhaps you can enjoy yourself…”

A home… wasn’t that a place with a family and people he loved? Narice had no idea what to expect that meant.

—

Narice looked up at the ceiling in his room as two sounds interrupted his sleep.

Beside him, a noisemaker came from a bedside table, he’d already pressed the button perhaps six times now. Following this, a more abrupt knock on the door signalling a ‘last call’.

“Hey, Narice,” his foster mom spoke.

His foster parents weren’t mean, they were simply who they were.

He’d somewhat adjusted to this new life. It was filled with unusual magic. He’d started with the basics, the vehicles that drove across the highways were called ‘cars’.

This land of humans, even though they weren’t supposed to have magic, seemed to have magic that was even more advanced than Narice’s home.

He’d been given a bed, a T.V., a desk. A light switch.

He would try to figure out where the Aqayans were later, but for now he got on his backpack and opened up his door.

“The bus is ready.”

He opened up the door and got ready for his first day at ‘school’. He’d only been in a vehicle once with the policeman and he had already fallen asleep.

This would be his first adventure in the human’s land, school.

—

He took a seat next to another kid. At his age, he would be assigned to sixth grade. It seemed he’d have to take the dumbed down classes, since he hadn’t really been educated about the same things as these students. He’d learned basic math and English and whatnot.

“Hey man, I was saving this for a friend…”

“Oh,” Narice said.

“Just take the one in the back,” he said.

“Oh.”

“Is that all you can say?”

Narice didn’t want to stand out too much so he picked up his bag and started walking.

“Hey- you can sit next to me if you want.” a bigger fellow who looked a little younger than the first kid spoke.

“Uh, thanks,” he replied. He sat next to the bigger kid. It was a fine fit, and gave them enough room, but a third person wouldn’t make it.

“So, what grade are you?” he asked.

“I’m in sixth, but they’re having me catch up on remedial.”

“Heh, the kid’s stupid,” the first kid he sat next to said to his ‘friend’, “I knew it.”

“Oh cool,” the big guy said. He seemed pretty nice.

“I’m Narice,” Narice said with a slight nod, ignoring the comment.

“Jonathan,” the kid replied.

“Look, the nerd made a friend,” one of the other kids said pointing at Jonathan.

“What’s a nerd?” Narice asked the kid who mentioned it.

“What, are you from another country?”

“It’s someone that doesn’t fit in,” another of the kids responded with an upturned nose.

“Oh, so you’re saying that you’re better?” Narice tightened his hand into a fist.

The bus got quiet.

“It’s whatever,” Jonathan said below his breath, “don’t worry about it.”

Narice was fine with people picking on him, he was used to it, but he didn’t like that people would pick on someone else.

He punched the kid in the head so hard that the kid passed out.

There, he thought to himself.

The other kids shut up.

“He’s out cold…” he heard them whisper.

“Don’t mess with Narice…” he heard another say.

“Yeah, he’s some sort of freak.”

The bus lurched ahead.

He looked outside the window, he was surprised at how it could move. Everything moved by him so quickly, he’d only been used to travelling on bare feet, he hadn’t learned to ride a horse or anything faster than a sailboat.

That’s why he liked running, the faster he ran the faster he got somewhere.

“You’re pretty strong…” he said to Narice.

“Yeah,” he replied nonchalant.

“Cool.”

The rest of the trip was pretty uneventful, Narice enjoyed the scenery while the other kids tried to keep their distance.

Jonathan noticed this too.

After the bus stopped in front of the building, the people slowly got out.

Narice got off and stood in front of the bus in awe. The building was so big.

“Hey, watch out,” one of the kids getting off said, “-uh, oh, sorry.”

Jonathan used this to his advantage, “yeah- that’s right, just move along,” he replied.

Narice ignored it and instead looked at the building.

“Have you been to school before?” Jonathan said.

“Uh…. yeah,” Narice replied, “but it was a lot different.”

“Oh, well. What’s your homeroom?”

“Err,” Narice pulled out his sheet, “It just says 107. – Ms. Fizzle.”

“Yeah, that should be on the left hallway,” he said. “I’ll take you there and then see you on the bus back.”

They walked into the building. There were more magical lights above him, Narice was getting used to it.

They reached the room.

It seemed that 107 was the room for ESL. He’d have to take of his communicator is if he was actually going to learn English.

“Hey, you speak English fine,” Jonathan spoke up, “but they put you in here…”

“Well, I can’t really write it…” Narice replied- not exactly a lie, but not exactly the full story.

“Have you been living on a deserted island or something?” he spoke.

Narice decided to be quiet to the question. I guess at one point his island was deserted.

“Anyway, I gotta get to class,” he said as he stuck out his hand. Narice looked at it and then took it- his first friend.

Narice went to his first class, homeroom.

When he got inside he noticed a few others sitting in chairs and a teacher standing in the front.

He tried to do what the other kids did and sat in an open seat.

This was much different than the village- where classes were in a circle on the ground or outside participating in something the teacher showed them about each element.

He took off his communicator. It’d be interesting if he could understand them.

“Suzy.” Narice watched the teacher call out one of the student’s names- and saw ‘Suzy’ raise her hand.

“Gavin,” the procedure continued.

“Narice?” she said- Narice followed suit.

“alne galkn ges ‘hi’ ae Narice,” she said. He watched as the other students said, ‘hi’ while raising their hands.

School didn’t seem too bad.

—

Little by little he would learn a new word.

Days went by like this, he was constantly coming home and learning new words, and trying to figure out his homework without the communicator on- he already knew some of the basic math and such, but without being able to read, it made it that much harder.

—

Eventually a year passed- nothing out of the ordinary occurred for the next year or so, and he’d finally caught up with some of his classes.

—

It was the next school year and Narice adjusted to classes by now. It was fourth period. Narice had his head up against his wrist while leaning on it. It wasn’t that he didn’t care, well, maybe it was. Class was boring. He much more enjoyed the freedom of open skies and enjoying life on the land. He tried his hardest to be a good student, but he couldn’t forget his life beforehand. Perhaps, that’s what ‘Ka’atra’ wanted- a life with Narice out of the way.

He no longer needed the communicator, which would be useful to disguise himself amidst humans.

“Attention class, everyone looked up. Narice noticed a girl, relatively close to his age, dark haired and blue eyed, “We have a new student, Rei.”

Narice looked at her, she seemed something familiar despite never having met. It didn’t bother him. For some reason however, he felt a tug and started to remember his village.

“If you’d like you can take a seat next to Jones,” Narice watched as she sat down. She seemed so familiar.

Oh well, he went back to leaning his head against his hand and dazing out of the lecture.

He much preferred hunting or building or whatnot.

“Narice!” his head slipped off his hand and the class laughed. The teacher hit him on the back with her ruler. He must have dozed off.

The new girl he noticed didn’t laugh, instead, she gave him just a quick glance, and then looked back.

The bell rang.

Narice left with the rest of the class.

“Narice,” the teacher pulled him aside to talk. “Stop dozing off. If you don’t, I’ll have to bring in your parents.”

“Yeah, sorry,” he said- barely meaning it. Narice readjusted his bag as he left.

—

He was about to get to his next class when the girl came up to him.

“So you’re Narice, huh?”

“Yeah, do I know you?”

“You’re an Ancient…” ‘Rei’ spoke to him.

After all this time… he’d thought he’d be able to keep it hidden.

“Uh… I’m the same age as you,” Narice wasn’t sure what she was getting at so he feinted ignorance.

“Nice try,” she replied. “If you want to know more, follow me.”

Something intrigued him about the offer, but he had little knowledge about what her intentions were.

“Who’s asking?”

“Weren’t you listening in class? It’s Rei…”

“How would you know I’m an ‘Ancient’?”

“It’s ok. I’m one too.”