He was walking down the streets, looking for a reaction. It was midday and the sun was out, so despite the fact that it was winter, it was warm enough to walk around without feeling too cold. Just a few weeks prior, he felt a disturbance coming from somewhere east. Since then he has been travelling from city to city, village to village, trying to find what caused it.

And now he had finally found the place where it came from.

Now he just had to find out if something came with the disturbance.

It was a gamble, really, sometimes a beast, object or person would manage to cross over, but more often than not, nothing managed to get through.

And this time it looked like something did indeed cross over, if what he heard in the news was to be believed.

He would have to either find some traces of magic, the crime scene or get his hands on the police report to make sure though.

But he was already pretty sure that something crossed over. The timing was just too perfect. Not a week after the disturbance and a gruesome murder happened. And, if he were to believe the news, at least four more happened in the last few weeks.

And his experience told him that someone, or something, crossed over. He just hoped it wasn’t a parasite or cursed object, these were always a pain to deal with. The last time a parasite appeared he had to search a whole town for about half a year, until he finally found it. During that time the parasite managed to kill twenty people, one being a friend he made. Worst part through, he found this fucker by mere chance, not with his own strength. The host of the parasite somehow managed to gain control, or sort of control, and started to run naked down the street, screaming that he was possessed by a demon. The parasite, of course, didn’t like that and used a fair amount of force to gain control again, and that’s when he walked by, just in time to see the parasite.

What happened is better left unsaid; it is enough to say that he managed to kill that thing, together with the host.

Sadly, the time he spent searching for that thing was completely wasted. No new clue popped up during the investigation, and here he was so sure that Charles would be there. At least he managed to kill that thing, but he still had to figure out how to identify parasites.

Shaking his head, he focused on his task at hand. He had to find the thing that crossed over, hunt it down and, in the best case, capture it. Maybe he would have luck this time and Charles would get involved. Because the longer he waited, the colder the trail went and that was never good.

Hahh he sighted I should have put James or Zoey up for this, I really can’t waste my time with this.

And normally he would have put someone else up for it, but something bothered him about this.

Somehow the disturbance didn’t feel ‘normal’, if you can call a disturbance normal. But that’s beside the point, something felt strange, and he couldn’t quite put his finger on it. It almost felt like the time the first disturbance happened, just not so chaotic. It felt way more controlled.

And that’s what worried him because if something, or someone, managed to get hold of that power, it would mean disaster.

That was something he can’t let happen.

The world wouldn’t be able to handle a second impact. The first one was already bad enough.

Two days already passed since he arrived in the city, and he still found nothing. In itself that wasn’t so untypical, considering the size of the city, but he still would feel irritated by the amount of time it took to just find something in these huge cities.

Goddamn, towns here are just way too big, there is no way I find something here, especially on the roads. I need a better view.

He walked on the streets for a few more minutes, until he found a back alley that was just far enough away from any potential preying eyes. After making sure no one was following him, he went into the back alley, looked around just to be sure, and gathered Particles. First he gathered some around his knees, in order to jump higher, and then he gathered some of the Wind and used these to guide him.

With his preparations done, he jumped and landed on the roof of one of the buildings. Thanks to the Wind, he managed to land without making a sound.

Walking on the rooftops of the buildings of the city, he looked for the location, or at least remains, of the rift.

Should have done that earlier

With swift and near silent movements, he made his way across the rooftops looking for the cause of all of his troubles.

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Just before he called it quits for the day, he came upon something strange. While he was checking for possible locations, he thought for a moment that he felt a reaction. Not the disturbance kind of reaction, but the human-magic kind of reaction, which was strange, because humans with power were rare, extremely rare. Especially in this world.

He knew that none of his people were in this city at the moment, heck, most of them didn’t even have the gift of Particles. And the ones who do, well, they are at the moment taking care of a rift somewhere in another country, which name he couldn’t quite recall.

Goddamn, the language was already hard enough, but to also learn the history and geographic is just unreasonable.

It was a very weak reaction and he felt it only for a short moment. Which meant one of two things, either there was someone very weak, who didn’t know how to use the power properly, which was already bad enough, or, and he dreaded that thought, he had to deal with someone who knew exactly how to use Particles. The first one he could easily deal with, maybe even recruit, but if it was the second type, then he had a problem.

And because none of his people were here, that meant that it was either the one who crossed over, or one of his people.

Both cases were pretty bad and he hoped it was a false alarm. His sensor going off because of some sort of technological stuff he just so happened to pass by. It wouldn’t be the first time something like that happened.

Particles and this thing called Electricity really didn’t mix well.

But it also wouldn’t be the first time where he hoped that was the case but he was wrong.

With a heavy sigh he decided to stop and investigate. For better or worse there weren’t any people outside from where he picked up the signal. Now, was this a blessing or not? Normally he would count himself lucky, but here he wasn’t so sure. Too many people lived in these tiny apartments, and too many apartments were too close to each other. It wasn’t too unusual for people to live that close to each other, but that so many people lived so close to each other was still something he didn’t quite liked.

That meant that his search could go two ways. Either he decides to stay near where he felt the reaction and waits for another one, which could either result in him wasting his time or finding a useful clue, or he continues his search and comes by the area from time to time, which meant that he wouldn’t waste as much time, but he could potentially miss another reaction.

He was a bit torn between these two options, but lucky for him, he didn’t have to make a decision.

Because just before he was about to shrug it off and go back, he could feel it. There wasn’t even the need for his sensor to react. It was tiny, minuscule even, but he could feel something.

Something, or someone, was using Particles. Not in a grand fashion, not even a lot, but he could feel it. And whatever was using it was … bad?

It was really bad at using them. It was so bad that he was surprised that they were even reacting. That was on an embarrassing level of bad.

At least now he could be sure, whatever was the cause for the reaction is alive, or rather, he was pretty sure that it was a human.

Only humans can be that bad. Creatures had the natural advantage that they don’t have to learn how to control particles. At least not like humans have to learn it. They are able to manipulate them, using them to their advantage, almost by instinct. That was also one of the reasons why creatures are so feared.

And judging from this reaction, it couldn’t be a creature. Not even a small one. That was kind of reassuring. So long as he could figure out who emitted the power of manipulation, he should be able to find and, in the worst-case scenario, apprehend him or her. But that led to another question. How did the person gain the power? You don’t just stumble upon it and you most certainly can’t just control it without being taught. Not even by mistake. But what else could it mean?

Was someone using particles but wanted to conceal it? No, that can’t be it. The control was too unstable for that. You can’t even lift a simple piece of paper with that level of control. Maybe someone was doing an experiment. But what could the experiment be? Using so little control was useless; you shouldn’t even be able to do anything with that.

So maybe, just maybe, it really was someone who didn’t know what they were doing. That… was more than just a bit unsettling. After all, someone who could control particles without proper training was unheard of but what could be even worse, was that the person was doing it without realising it. Meaning it was a disaster in the making. He had to check. The situation was too strange and dangerous to just ignore it.

Hopefully it wouldn’t turn into another messy situation that took way too long to resolve. Lately there have been too many situations that went to shit.

Having decided to prioritise this situation over the beast, he made himself a small space on the roof of the building on the opposite site and waited. It would take some time, maybe days, before he could identify his target, and in that time the beast would strike again. But that’s life he thought can’t make a decision without making a sacrifice. And who knows? Maybe the beast situation and this one is connected and I can resolve them at the same time. Actually, now that I think about it, it would be strange if these two situations aren’t connected. Just have to wait for a bit.

Maybe I can finish the moving picture that James told me to watch. What was it called again? Something about a man made out of iron or so.