People are like ants; following orders left by people they never met, doing things for no benefit for themselves, and utter idiots in any sort of disaster. When they hear of death and chaos, they flock to it like lemmings, never mind the potential harm to themselves! Oh no, after all, it could never happen to them! When they heard that a government office building blew up, the gawkers came in droves.

We were trying to quickly evacuate down the fire stairs, everyone except for me not knowing what happened, in a mass of sweaty humanity. The people around me had only a modicum of mana and the basest understanding of how to use it-yet they thought themselves special-it was an supremely sad display. I was willing to bet that most of them didn't have enough power to rub together to even light a cigarette. I grabbed the shoulder of a woman biting her lip anxiously, and said "Do you know where they keep confiscated materials in here?" Normally, she would have been suspicious and wondered why the Hell a man wearing clothes that were too tight for him was asking about items in police custody, but most people lose their wits in a crisis. "In the Occult Intelligence's property room on the fifth floor,like always,"

I wordlessly split off into a corridor on the stairway that was conveniently on the fifth floor, and I heard say behind me "Wait! What department do you work for!" I ignored her and strode into the anonymous room that strove to be like any other, laden with porcelain tiles and bright lights. I saw a heavy, steel vault door and knew that that was where they had my stuff. I didn't really care about tact or finesse normally and now that I was in a burning building, I really didn't care. The vault was probably enchanted and had a whole slew of hexes on it to ward off happy-go-lucky people like me, but that didn't stop it from folding like a lawn chair when I punched it with the force of a semi-truck. Fire, lightning, and ice raced out and slammed into me but I already was looking like I got dragged to Hell and back so it didn't matter.

They put my stuff in a box near the corner and after I put my coat back on, I saw a bag of heroin they had lying around which I took in case it could be valuable and as a half-assed attempt of trying to throw them off of my trail. Having gotten the things I came here for, I slammed my foot down repeatedly and rode my express elevator down threw each floor until I fell into a crowd of confused people wandering why someone fell through the ceiling. I gave them a cordial nod like this happen everyday and walked out before anyone could ask any questions.

A press of firefighters ran in trying to calm the people as I walked out and one of them threw a coat at me, thinking I was another victim staggering around in shock. I took it and wrapped it around me, playing the part they thought I was playing.

An explosion shook the air and everyone rushed out of the building together like an enormous millipede. The pedestrians rushed over to them, asking the most inane questions and asking for autographs, and tried to take pictures of the inferno above them. They paid no heed to the fact that it could all come crashing down upon them or thought about their own survival.

I got onto the streets of D.C and tried to figure out where this "Smithsonian" was when I saw a girl standing on a bridge. Curious, I walked to her to get a closer look. The first thing I noticed about her was her green hair (they were like sea foam and looking like they were purposely made to look like she just got out of bed) and lurid amount of piercings; lips, nose, tongue, you name it and she'll have them somewhere. She had on ripped jeans that didn't seem like they were ripped beforehand and we're all too tight. She was wearing a black, studded leather jacket over a t-shirt faded to obscurity and that were artfully ripped to expose certain amounts of skin. Tattoos were scrawled over her like a psychedelic nightmare, images of Vedic art drawn entirely in black and self-pitying quotes in ample amounts. She was as pale as willow tree and looked like she spent most of her time in musty basements listening to whatever local band that was there at the time. You could tell that she wasn't wearing a bra even from here.

When she saw that I was walking towards and wasn't just another pedestrian wandering the streets, she purposefully took out a cigarette from her pocket and when I got close enough, she started blowing smoke rings into my face. It was so comical that I burst out laughing, both at the classic teenage ennui and how it was nothing compared to some of the things you smelt in Avalon. She didn't know what to make of me laughing like a loon when I should've been the grumpy adult sputtering in outrage, so she insulted me "Are you crazy or something? Do you like getting blown by girls more than half you age or something?" She tried to be rebellious and edgy but to my ears that have heard the sounds of a world trying to tear itself apart, it was frankly quite cute-like a puppy trying to bite your finger. She was sneering at me until I finally managed to control myself.

"Done laughing at me yet fuck-face?" She spit that out at me like I was a basilisk.

"I'm sorry, but I just thought that you fit the teenage angst trope to a T," I said with mirth still in my words. She rolled her eyes at this and said with disgust "Typical. Just typical of me, to be fucking laughed at by an old dude while I'm trying to kill myself," This caught my attention and I said sharply to her "You're what!" She did that arrogant little sneer again and said "Now you care, people only care about me if they have an opportunity to make themselves feel morally righteous about themselves. Oh look, there's the suicidal girl. You know what I should do, I should pretend to be her friend so I can feel good at Church later! That's all they ever do,"

I was silent for a time, I didn't know how to react to this. She was giving me a look, trying to see what I was going to do next. I said to her quietly "Why do you want to die?" I didn't expect her to be so quiet for so long. A few more minutes passed and then she said "Because. I don't feel like there's anything else to live for," She said it with such a lackluster amount of emotion that reminded me of myself when I was young. I asked her "Do you know about magic?" She snorted and said condescendingly "That's all the media plays on the TV nowadays, just boring clips of scientists explaining how this affects this atom and stuff. It's nowhere as exciting as the books made them out to be. All they taught us was this," She snapped her fingers and a faint flame appeared as she raised another cigarette to it and started smoking. How strange it was, talking to a suicidal girl on a bridge in the middle of the day.

I made my mind up and said to her "Listen. Your life is your life, I can't tell you what to do with it, but I can't just leave you here to die. Is there anything I can do to help," Again, she gave me that jaded sneer and she grabbed my collar "What can you possibly do to help?"

I though about this for a few moments and said "Magic. I can teach you magic," Her eyes widened and she grabbed me harder and looked into my eyes as she said "How would a hobo like you know magic?" I smirked self-depreciatingly at her comment, I did look like a homeless person after all. I gently removed her hands from my shirt and raised my right hand. She looked at it suspiciously. "Can I have your name at least? If I'm going to be showing you my magic?" She disdainfully looked at me. I sighed and told her to watch the river. I closed my eyes and let my instincts take over until I felt the right moment to unleash the power. Finding the right moment, I shouted out a random nonsense word to help direct it-I didn't know if magic was somehow weaker in Earth. Luckily, I was as strong as ever and the aftermath of me throwing a kinetic cannonball at the river was us being thoroughly drenched in water from head-to-toe. She was wide-mouthed at this and she was sputtering as she tried to talk.

"How! What! But! Ugh!" I just stood there with a quiet grin. She seemed to grow by ten sizes when she was grinning at me. She wrapped herself around me and placed one hand on my cheek as she said seductively while biting her lip "I don't suppose that you'll mind teaching a lost girl a little magic, would you?" I ignored her elementary attempts at seduction and said brightly "Sure! I just need you to do one thing for me!" An instant look of disgust popped onto her face. She punched me as hard as she could and stepped back from me. Strange, considering how she seemed like she was about to have sex with me right on the bridge. I raised both of my hands in placation and said "That's not what I meant! I just need you to give me directions to the Smithsonian,"

She looked at me suspiciously again and said "And that's all. No weird stuff. No kidnapping me and selling me off to the cartels,"

"No weird stuff," I said in agreement. "Great! Now let me show you where the Smithsonian is!" I blinked at the sudden change from depression to seduction to disgust to cheerfulness. Also, I was going to get directions, ditch her, and leave her mad but alive, looks like that she saw through that and now I wouldn't be able to get rid of her.

"Come on! Hurry up!" She said as she grabbed my hand and dragged me down a series of meandering alleys and backends. I was struggling to keep up with her as she leapt over trash cans and rubbish. "Your name?" I shouted at her as she jumped on top of a taxi. "What about it!" She shouted back as I tried to copy her move but failed miserably, landing most precariously. "You didn't tell me it yet!" I yelled as we tried to lose the patrol cop chasing after us. A silent second before she replied quietly "It's Temperance," I raised an eyebrow at that and said "Really? She got mad at that and said back in a snarky tone "Yeah, I know that it's funny with me and all but it gets really annoying when everyone you meet comments on that like I had a say in what my name would be,"

It was funny how mad she got at that, I had a quiet grin on my face as I imagined how she would be sneering. She guessed that I was probably smiling at that so she flipped over a hot dog stand in the park we were in. I tripped over it and fell on my face, I probably deserved that. But that didn't stop me from using magic to push her into the bushes. I burst out laughing as I saw the comical look on her face as she somehow got pushed meters into the roses. I stopped when I got to her and had a wide grin on my face as she tried to get out without messing up her hair. "Need a hand?" I said to her mockingly. Which explained why she punched me in the gut. "Shut up and follow me," You know, I would bet that the reason why she turned around so quickly was so that I couldn't see the grin on her face. We were like this all the way to the museum. It's amazing what just a few hours away from Avalon could do for me, I need to get out more.