Written in the Stars [Dubloon]

There was very little that could set this night apart from the rest. It was dark and cold, as was tradition within the native lands of Ontario, Canada. The darkness was lit by the distant stars to make a rather breath taking landscape, one that could be observed from beyond the city lights.  It wasn't the sight you'd expect in stories, it wasn't perfect, but it was beautiful.


That had said that a long time ago. So long ago in fact it was almost as if it hadn't been him at all. That it had been someone else. It was the words of an optimistic dead man, and yet he was simply here now to endure the suffering. Blinded to the beauty that lie within. But nothing could take the beauty of this night away, nothing within the confines of what could be fathomed at any rate. The shimmering stars, the lowly settled city of Toronto lay as the majority of the populous slumbered. Tonight was a beautiful night as Toronto, Queen City, would meet a King.

A small wormhole appeared through a back alley, fixating in a loading parking lot that was home to a little litter of hoodlums and thugs. First there was just the small glowing black sphere, then a brilliant blue light flashed as electricity crackled and a sea-foam green mist permeated the air, the smell of ocean water becoming prominent.  In simple seconds the street rats watched as hues of maroon seeped through and the three colors formed an indigo amalgam, little flecks of it's component colors sparking off as the wormhole grew, only to violently suction itself back in and let out a small flash.

From the flash was a man dressed in all black, two different colored eyes scanned the area as a scowl formed on his pale face. His black priestly garment accented with metallic spikes and chains driven into his arms, hanging off of him like a goth rock star. To his right was a tanned young man with dark brown hair and faintly glowing eyes of emerald. They looked upon the world around them, letting out breaths that turned to a frosty mist before their eyes. The tanned young man smiled as he looked down upon his red clothed with gold lacing and began to jump up and down in excitement.

"We've done it! We're here! We're really here!" He shouted as he broke into hysterical laughter. It didn't take long for the observers of this event to approach, one of their eyes glowing red and another protruding spikes from their body.

"Boy did you come to the wrong place..." the first one said as he slapped the baseball bat in his hand, like a nun with a ruler. The tan young man couldn't help but mile as he shook his head, though his paler compatriot seemed to be less than amused.

"No, sir. I actually believe we are right where we want to be." He said with a slight accent, one that had probably been used by the natives whom once colonized the region. His accent wasn't even questioned though as the man just took a few steps forward. "Right, well. Don't threaten me with a good time boys." he said as he stepped around the tanned young man, whom turned his eyes to the street through the darkest alley. He could hear the sound of mass thrown through the air, the whoosh and whips and the other noises of combat. but none of that interested him. He took to the street, running and stopping as he slowly realized how horribly he stuck out in gold laced appearance.

"E-Excuse me?" He shouted to a nearby woman, though she simply ran away. He blinked before he realized that all the people that were looking at him were speaking a language he didn't understand. But that's when realized that there was a large problem he hadn't calculated in his travel to this strange and foreign place.

"Черт возьми!"

Down one of Toronto’s many alleyways rested a small off the grid hideout. That hideout was nearly pitch dark except for the light of a computer monitor that illuminated one corner of the small space. A young dark skinned girl sat in front of that monitor, her inhumanly neon green eyes scanning the text on the screen. Her brows furrowed and knitted together as she tried to wrap her mind around the information displayed on the screen. Nu had no idea what lead her to this web page she was looking at nor did she have any idea what a quiche was, but it looked yummy.

She leaned away from the screen and scratched the side of her head as she stared at the recipe. The sudden sound of water running through the pipes above her head let her know that her neighbors were home and that it was roughly eight or nine pm without having to check the time on her computer. These neighbors, as Nu liked to call them, were completely unaware of her existence, hell nobody even knew that a living space the size of a studio apartment had been carved into the building. This little space was Sionas’ last gift to Nu before he left her, and while she might have found a new home with Travis Masters, aka Alpha, and his family, this small space held sentimental value to her.

The mute rubbed her eyes and let out a silent yawn as she rose from her seat and waddled over to the refrigerator. Nu knew what to expect when she opened the door, but she still somehow found a way to be disappointed in the fact that the fridge was completely empty, minus one milk carton and a few eggs. She let out a silent sigh as she began to feel her stomach rumble. The girl would wander back over to her computer where her neon eyes would stay fixated on the picture of the delicious looking tart. She began to contemplate one of the hardest decisions she had to make on a daily basis, would she go out to eat, or would she attempt to make something?

Nu shook her head and mustered up enough resolve to get out of this lazy mood she had been in for the past week. She would be productive today, she would try to make a quiche! Now that she actually had a reason to get out of the house, the little mute found a font of energy she didn’t know she had. With a spring in her step and a smile on her face she quickly got ready and made her way out the door. Her resolve was instantly tested however, as she was greeted by the bitter cold of the night. With her arms wrapped around her for extra warmth, Nu stood on the stoop of her hideout shivering and cursing her idea.

It was in this moment that Nu felt a weird twinge or tingling sensation at the base of her neck. Something seemed off, she couldn’t tell what it was, but she usually didn’t have this feeling unless something was off, and it had been happening a lot lately. This just made her want to turn around and head back inside even more, but she toughened up for the sake of her stomach and began to march onward to the nearest market.

Nu’s neon green eyes were nearly glued to the screen of her phone as she made excellent use of his gps feature while she walked about town. While Nu was definitely one to see things through to the end, she was hardly one to actually prepare and a wave of shock came over the artificial human when she finally arrived at the market and realized she didn’t remember what it was she needed to buy in order to make the quiche. Luckily for her, this was the digital age and she had the web at her finger tips. After nearly an hour of wandering through the store aimlessly, the little mute had checked out and stepped back out into the chilly evening air, a paper bag full of groceries tucked tightly in her arms.

It was at this moment, when Nu stepped back outside, that she once again felt the strange tingling sensation in her neck. This time however, she had experienced the sensation when she looked across the street to seen a strangely dressed individual. His gold laced garb certainly stuck out in the crowd of drably dressed people that walked by, but more interesting was that he spoke a language Nu had never heard before. Feeling an odd sense of helpfulness, Nu looked both ways before rushing across the street to meet the foreign individual. She approached the dejected looking young man and gave him a light tap on the shoulder. A big smile crept onto her face and awaited the man as he’d turn to face her.

The young man was so lost and confused, speaking a language not native to this place as he looked about helplessly in awe of the world around him. He took Canada in for what it was, grateful for the chance to see the wonderous and magnificantly different cities. How this place hadn't succumbed to nuclear fire, Everyone knows. Terrible joke aside, the young man tugged upon his odd clothes and finally felt a tap to his shoulders. In a moment he turned around, his glowing green eyes met with a strange, dark skinend girl's and in a moment he saw something completely unreal. Something that wasn't possible to see. The woman was incoporeal, faintly glowing and entirely different. the essence was the same. It lasted for only a moment before his eyes faded slightly, and he had wondered if she had seen the same of him. Perhaps it was a reciprocated visage, or perhaps he was more familiar with his own abilities.

The tan skin compared to her dark skin wasn't entirely too different, both with glowing eyes and black hair. The only difference between them was that she had different pupils, almond shaped slits quite apparent, as he attempted to keep his own pupils from undergoing change. The first thing that came to mind was that this was his doppelganger, and that his associate's information was incorrect. He was short of breath, awestruck at looking upon a very magnificant being as he seemed to nervously swallow, knowing very well that there was one last test he needed to try.

"Can you....understand me?" He asked in a slightly different dialect, something that would more resonate with Nu. He waited and watched to see how she would respond. Of course it wasn't long before others started looking them over and a few people were making idle comments about him looking like a character straight from Game of Thrones. He didn't hear them truthfully, he was far more interested in the person he had found...or rather that had found him.

Slowly he began to look more and more excited, though the amassing eyes that wandered to him were beginning to irritate him, especially as more and more people began to whisper. Just because he didn't understand them didn't mean he didn't know he was being talked about. He seemed to slink away before turning back to the girl. "Such a foreign place?" It was truthfully a statement, but it was almost as if he had been seeking affirmation from the kind woman whom had approached him.

While the smile remained on Nu’s face, she did make a slight hop as her eyes locked with the young man’s when he spun around. The bright green hue was similar to hers, no as a matter of fact, they were the exact same color. The only thing that was different about his eyes were the pupils. For a brief moment the little mute looked the mysterious foreigner over. His skin tone even seemed to almost match hers as well, though he was a few shades lighter. Her heart began to race a bit and her mind raced. Could it be that this individual was like her? Could he have been from the same facility as her? She shook her head at the thought. There was no way he could have been from the same place that she came from, Sionas had made sure of that.

Still, the way he seemed to have been lost and spoke a different language resonated with Nu. She felt she couldn’t rule out the idea of him being like her. This partially got her hopes up. The thought of not being the only one of her kind was exciting. Nu managed to reign in her wild imagination and shifted her gaze back up to meet the young mans. As the two stared at one another in silence, Nu picked up on the little nuances the mystery man gave off. He seemed speechless, as if looking upon her brought him so sort of happiness?

The small moment the two seemed to be sharing was abruptly cut short when the foreigner opened his mouth to speak. While again not a language Nu could understand, she was able to understand what he was trying to say by looking at the expression on his face and his body language. Since Nu understood the message but not the language, saying yes to the young man would have been a lie, so in true Nu fashion she raised her hand and tilted it side to side trying to convey that she partially understood him.

It didn’t take long for Nu to take notice of all the hushed words being spoken around her and the mysterious young man. She looked all around her to see small groups of people scattered about, all of them looking in her’s and the man’s direction all while muttering stuff under their breath. Her brows narrowed and her face contorted into a scowl. She had half a mind to teach these people not to be so rude, but that wasn’t how she was raised, even if she wasn’t raised properly. She took a deep breath and remembered Sionas’ words and even a few things she had picked up while being around Alpha.

She turned around to give her attention back to the foreigner. The scowl left her face and was replaced with a look of mixed confusion and sadness. She felt back that she couldn’t immediately help the young man, but she wasn’t about to stop trying. She jogged up to him and moved in front of him to block his path. Again she didn’t understand what he had said, but as she had already decided, that wouldn’t stop her. She raised a finger as if signaling for the man to hold up.

Her slender hand slipped into her coat pocket and she pulled out her phone. She feverishly swiped through the various pages of apps on her phone till she came across what she was looking for. What she was looking for, and so happy to find, was an app Sionas had written and placed on her phone before he left. He never had the proper time to raise her and teach her much about the world, but in his moments of clarity he had done just about everything to prepare the little artificial human for future encounters. The app Nu had pulled up was a translator. It could take peoples spoken words and then translate them to English for the girl to read. Armed and ready, Nu motioned for the man to speak again, this time she held her phone out, albeit uncomfortably close to his face. Her eyes locked momentarily with his and she nodded at her phone with a smile.

The young man looked through the crowd, finding himself astounded, too astounded to pull a royal hissy fit and give the peasents the punishment they deserved. He did, however, notice the young woman was attempting at least, to understand him. She held out her form, then he seemed to understand what she was getting at. He cleared his throat and began to speak in the phone. Of course his voice was a higher octive as he spoke, and his words flowed together. He was hoping that somehow, or some way he was going to be able to converse with the woman. The phone began to try and translate his words, however the unforutnate fact was that her phone was processing several different languages and offering up so many suggestions.

"Hello. My name is...well that's unimportant. I'm not from here, but I have to say I truly like this domain. Can you tell me more about this place? What is it called? Are we on the farthest western lands, or are we eastern?" The young man began, frantically speaking with a growing smile on his face as he began to look around in awe, he finally looked back to Nu, only to hear the phone spit out a weird translation.

"Salvete! Unë jam...Ši vieta yra. Kiu el la landoj Je to obyvatelé? Bitchin' named la landoj Je." was all the phone managed to capture, in several different languages. By the time he could see this, or rather her reaction he quickly pulled out a small device of his own. He pulled out a car with a very strange looking alphabet. Oddly enough, there were 27 letters, all of them in the fashion of a standard English keyboard. He then pointed to one of the letters and began to make a noise, almost as if he were trying to express the noise that this letter/symbol made. This one was in the fashion of an "O". Hopefully they might find some common ground this way, or Nu had an idea regarding how to mince together a translation her own way.

The others all looked at them, though they began to walk away. Apparently this was an oddity, but not entirely too odd in this strange world they lived in.

The young mute furrowed her brow at her apps utter failure. It was supposed to take his words and translate them to text for her to read, not take his words and produce gibberish. That being said, the longer she stared at the text the more she realized that there was a sentence there. It was an amalgamation of several different languages. This only perplexed her further. When he spoke the words were fluid and sounded like a cohesive language, not this mismatched code. Still she’d try her best to decode it. This person was in need up help, and she was the only one willing to lend a hand.

As Nu fiddled through several apps to translate the message, the man had pulled out a chart of some kind and was sounding out one of the letters on it. It looked and sounded similar to ‘O’. Nu could feel a tinge of frustration building within her. Mainly at the translation app on her phone. Stupid little thing, it couldn’t even do its job right. After unscrambling the message, Nu was still left with a bit of a head scratcher. The combination of different dialects caused the structure of the sentence to be thrown out of wack. Still, there was one sting of words there, that gave the little mute some indication of what the man was asking.

Raising a finger to the air, Nu tried to signal that she had an idea, and for the man to wait. She really cursed her condition in times like this. If only she could speak. There was no use crying about it now, not that she ever had. Holding her phone sideways, Nu’s thumbs furiously patted against the screen. After several seconds of typing, Nu would hold her phone up for the man to read. Hopefully he understood it, otherwise she was going to have to find another way for the two of them to communicate.

|-Probably should have done this from the start. My name is Nu. Nice to meet you ^_^ We are currently in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.-| Nu stood there with a nervous smile on her face. Please let him be able to read that. She thought over and over again until the man spoke again.

By this point the crowd that had gathered around them, began to disperse. They had finally lost interest in the strange duo and proceeded to carry on with their routines. It didn’t really bother Nu all that much that they stared. What had bothered her is that no one stopped to help the man out. Now that they were all moving on, that feeling had passed and Nu could fully focus her attention on helping this stranger out.

The young man watched as she began to type letters down. For but a moment, they made no sense to him. Of course he quickly began to figure some of the structure out. He was truly lost. For a moment he began to sigh, but then he had an idea of his own. He began to chuckle as he reached into his pocket and produced a small cable with two small dime-sized magnets. Quickly he rolled up his one sleeve, revealing that his forearm had some strange metal device clasped over it, the numbers and letters on it glowing a faint green. After securing his own device, he produced the small thing to Nu and motioned to her phone. He wanted her to place the device on her phone. Assuming she complied the rest would be easy.

The letters and symbols on his arm piece began to rapidly blink before settling on english letters within the alphabet. Suddenly the armpiece spoke in a deep, vibrating and almost menacing robotic voice. It read-back the text, making sure to announce the “Carrot Underscore Carrot” part. Then it announced that it identified the language as “Allied English, second Generation” before saying that it was harmonizing auditory functions and instructing nanites. After a moment of brightly flashing colors and the voice whispering what appeared to be every letter in the english language in two seconds before rerouting, then powering down. The cord then would fall off of Nu’s phone and allow the young man to retrieve it. He looked up to her for a moment, almost scared or intimidated as one eye cautiously narrowed.

”D-Did it work?” He asked, his voice soft and slightly shy, uncertain and feeling awkward under the scrutiny of the stranger who might not have even been able to tell who he was. All he needed was a reaction, any reaction at all and he’d know.

Nu nearly found herself taking a step back as the brow above her right eye arched. She was not confused or frightened, but rather curious. Just what kind of device what this? She’d seen nothing like it before. Slowly reaching out and grasping the unattached end in her slender fingers, Nu hesitated for a moment. She was overly cautious and protective of her things, especially the things Sionas had given her. She didn’t want her phone to get ruined, but at the same time, this person needed help. Finding that the man’s needs far outweighed the working condition of her phone, Nu placed the device on her phone.

If she wasn’t curious before, she was now. Her neon green eyes tracked the faintly glowing characters on the strangers device. They lit up with a sense of mystery and excitement. Just what was the machine doing? She thought to herself. She waited with baited breath. The little artificial woman very suddenly leapt back as the arm piece began to speak. It had caught her off guard for sure, but she quickly regained her composure. Just as thoughts sprang into Nu’s head about how long this process was going to take, the small device detached itself from her phone.

The young man’s gaze locked with hers. Then he spoke! The young mute’s eyes lit up with joy. She could finally understand him. That also meant he could understand her. She began to jump up and down with glee, almost breaking into a mini dance of celebration. That quickly came to a halt when she realized she was doing this all in public and suddenly felt a wave of embarrassment wash over her. Her gaze would dart off to the side as she tried to compose herself.

To be honest she was just to embarrassed to look the young man in the eyes right away. Once she was certain she could feel the blood retreating from her cheeks she’d look the stranger in the face and nod with a smile. That’s when it dawned on her. She wasn’t entirely sure if he had caught on to the fact that she was mute. Perhaps he thought she didn’t speak due to the whole communication train wreck they had just went through. Nu would raise her free hand and point to her throat before then waving the same finger back and forth.

Nu would then rush to bring her phone back up to her face and she rapidly tapped away at the screen once more. Nu would then hold the phone up to the young man’s face for him to read. |-It worked! Sorry I we have to communicate this way. I can’t speak. So this is how I talk with people!-|

Nu sported a partial frown as she held the phone out. She hated that she couldn’t properly communicate with people. Using her phone felt so embarrassing? Degrading? She wasn’t sure what word it was she was looking for.

King Chimera was more than elated to see that it worked. He felt an uplifting joy as he actually jumped in excitement, a fist going up in victory. He started laughing as the young woman did the same, he hadn’t even realized that he was mirroring this girl. Celebration was acceptable in this world. That was good. Wait, she stopped? King Chimera looked around for a moment as he felt his face flush with embarrassment. Subconsciously his hand came up and he began to scratch the back of his neck. Several people still walked past, looking at the pair awkwardly. Some of the others smiled and even laughed. He tried to avoid eye contact with all of them, clearing his throat and nervously hiding himself.

”I am so gratefuuuuul?” He began to say, expressing earnest gratitude as the woman caught him and pointed to her throat. Her wagging finger caused his statement to draw out into an awkward type of question. Was he not supposed to speak? She then brought up the small box again before typing rapidly into it. The King attempted to not show much concern, though he found himself slightly anxious as to why he would sit in suspense. All was revealed, however as the lovely young woman rose the thing to his face.


”O-oh! I’m sorry. But...to be fair… you’ve proven more resourceful than I.” He said at first, before attempting to point out a silver lining with a genuine full smile. It was true, this woman had many methods. She wasn’t dependant upon her voice for things, so she learned to be innovative. ”What is this uh? This thing? Such a small and sleek design...” He mused, hand coming up as his index finger curled over his chin and he examined the phone. He seemed actually perplexed by the device in an almost pleasant way.

Nu waved her hand’s back and forth trying to show that man that there was no need for him to apologize. There was no way for him to know she was mute after all. So that fault mostly rested on her for not addressing the issue earlier on. That being said she was happy to have been of some assistance. And because of that assistance, the two could now understand and communicate with one another. This evening was turning out to be quite alright. Especially since Nu hated leaving her little hole in the wall she called a home.

Nu did her best to hold the smile on her face, but couldn’t help but arch a brow in confusion. How did the stranger not know what a cellphone was? Nu would have contributed that to him being from some foreign country, but he was packing tech of his own. It was quite sophisticated to, or at least she thought it was. Nu wasn’t very tech savvy so she couldn’t really say. Still, the young man asked a question and Nu felt happy to answer.

Her neon green eyes shifted back to the screen on her phone and her thumbs began tapping away at it furiously. She had gotten quite good at this whole typing on the phone thing. Once her message was all typed up she held the phone back out for the strange young man to read. |-This here is a cellphone! Though it’s more like a mobile computer. You can do all kinds of stuff with it. Brows the internet. Send texts. Make calls. And even play games! Or watch stuff! ^_^ -| Nu’s eyes sparkled with enthusiasm. If he was intrigued by the phone before, he was going to flip when he saw all the cool stuff it could do.

Nu felt so proud of herself as she showed of the small device to the stranger. It was your classic case of showing off. Like when a little kid went to school with brand new shoes and couldn’t wait to show them off. That was the feeling Nu was having right now.

So it was a cellphone? Was it a phonetic device used to gauge something on the cellular level, or was it a phonetic transfer device that worked within a cellular area. The possibilities both sparked King Chimera’s curiosity as well as his creativity. That was an idea he’d need to stow for later. Though this woman was all too happy to show him all of the interesting this “Cellphone” could do, as well as show off how it was more akin to a small portable computer with the recreational wastes of time and possibly even money. She seemed to be quite pleased with herself, however.

King Chimera’s eyes began to glow slightly. The one eye was an emerald green while the other was an indigo color, the more fascinated he wasa the more his eyes seemed to spark to life, like small Christmas lights. He was in fact fascinated as he took out a small device from his own pocket. It appeared to be a small disc of some kind. It was a brass, or almost bronze type of color with polished feel to it. It has four rivets sticking out on either end. He smiled as she showed him this device, though he began to spin the small disc on the palm of his hand, setting his hand beneath the cellphone.

“This device can do all of that? Next you’ll tell me that you have machines that control the weather.” He said with a smile, though his face paled slightly as he looked concerned to the young woman, as if silently asking her to “Please tell me that’s not the case.” The disc made a buzzing noise, a series of chirping and warbling sounds as he watched what the woman did. Every move she made he was sure to try and keep the disc beneath the phone.

"So this obviously allows you to stay connected as a tribe. However...what are these movies and what games? Can you actually do something like Zen's Crossing?"He asked all of this, completely uncertain if she would even know what he was talking about.

Nu’s gaze kept shifting between her mysterious acquaintance and her phone. For some reason she found it very intriguing to see the man’s reaction to everything she did. It was because of Nu’s intrigue in the man’s reactions that she noticed a few small details. The first of which were his glowing eyes. This was not strange to the artificial human however. It only made her like this person a bit more. For once she wasn’t the only one with the funny eyes. The second thing she noticed, she did not take a liking to right away.

She had noticed the strange object the mystery man had produced. And her first instinct was to pull her phone away. It was the only thing she had after all that allowed to her communicate with others. It was a gift from Sionas before he left her, so to her the small mobile device was very near and dear to her heart. So naturally when she saw the bronze colored disk she immediately assumed it was going to cause harm to the device. This thought quickly went away as Nu thought about her actions and how rude it must have seemed to the outsider.

She’d slowly move her phone back into the figures field of view for him to see. When she did, she was met by a question. A question that seemed odd to her. But she gave it some thought anyway. Placing an index finger against her lower lip Nu tried to imagine if she had ever heard of a machine capable of controlling the weather. The idea wasn’t to far fetched. Her attention was then be gripped by another question as the man wanted to know what Nu had meant by movies and games. The example he gave did not ring any bells, and so Nu gave him a quick shrug before pointing to the screen.

If he wanted to know what she meant, then he was going to get a demonstration. First up was showing him a movie, or in this case a few seconds of a TV show she had downloaded to her phone. The whole time the show was on her screen she kept her eyes on the man’s seeing if she could notice the change of expression on his face. After those fer seconds were up, Nu pulled the phone away for a moment to type up a message. After which she flashed the screen at the stranger. |-That was just a clip from a show I watch…its basically the same thing as a movie! Next is a game!-|

Once Nu was certain the man had read the message she swiped through several pages of apps till she game across a page in which on of the icons looked like a yellow rabbit like creature with pink spots on its cheeks. With a quick tap the game was launched and Nu did a quick run through the menus before showing off a bit of gameplay. The brief time she fumbled around with the game made her smile. It brought back memories of Sionas. He was the one who had showed her this game and if she remembered correctly he had said something about it being his daughters favorite game. It quickly became Nu’s favorite way of passing time soon after that. The smile faded a bit. She really missed Sionas. She wished she could find him, but the world was a large place, and Nu was still to afraid of straying very far from home.