Falling

[MICHAEL MATTHIAS WINSTON]

He looked around at the streets with a frown, biting his lip slightly. It was hard to find things here…and everything was really bright. He looked down a bit, shuffling across the ground to go over to where there was a hot dog stand. He didn’t understand money up here quite yet, and he looked confused as he looked to the prices.

He did keep going to look at them, but on multiple occaisions, passing people caused him to be knocked down, and he fell with a small thump, making little noise. Michael eventually bit his lip slightly, trying to stop tears from welling up. He was trying to understand why people got hot dogs for paper, that didn’t have any food in it.

His soft, grey eyes were squinting and closing as he took in shuddering breaths, to try and hold himself together. The boy was skinny, and it was obvious he hadn’t had much food in quite a while. Though he wasn’t close to death, he was still in a bit of a desperate situation. Michael got up and on the sidewalk again, scared. Everything was so different.

[DR JASPER ANVIL]

"Thank you very much for your information, Sir." Dr. Jasper Anvil slid his notebook and his pen back into his trenchcoat. What a day. "Datsh... datsh no poblem, offishhhher... " the man on the small bench answered, before falling over the back and doing something that could be called a hangover or a slightly misplaced and painful yoga practise. Jasper used his hand to try and shove away the strong alcoholic smell from his nose. Investigating in this part of the city had never been his favourite, but for one or two bottles of cheap -very cheap- wodka, people talked alot. And alot was really ALOT! Luckily enough he usually was figure out the important parts of such an monologue.

Jasper was now walking through the street, always careful of those little hot dog salesmen, who tried to shove you their ways too cheap and bad tasting saussages right into the face, just to give you a reason to puke into the next trash bin. Especially if you had wodka before. It was lunch time actually, but Jasper prefered the kind of lunch that he could keep inside, it was more refreshing that way. He knew that part of the city well, and therefor also the only hot dog and hamburgers stand that sold edible things. And not wares that just looked and smelled edible. Jeff's Hot Dogs was located around the corner, and given the money he took for one of those, using quality payed off for him.

Jasper had just passed the corner, as he noticed a little boy. Although... noticed was not the fitting word. Almost fell over... yes, that was it. He was lucky enough to not have been to much in thoughts, theefor he did not hit the poor boy down, but almost. Stopping right in front him, he looked down and immideately frowned. A tearful face, the tears maybe had fallen down on the ground, but still. That boy looked quite sad, maybe even byond that. Jasper crouched next to the boy to have a better look at that face. What had happened to make a child cry that way? Lost his mother? Hit down by pedestrians maybe?

"Hi there, little one. I'm Jasper. Why are you crying? Do you want a hot dog?"

[MICHAEL MATTHIAS WINSTON]

Michael looked up to the male, sniffling a little bit. He was tired, he was scared, and he was hungry. He sniffled lightly, rubbing the tears from his eyes, and quickly looking away. He was nervous…interaction with another person rarely happened for him, because he was normally unnoticed, and half the time barreled over. This person stooped down to his level and spoke.

At first, presented with this as a problem, Michael was completely lost. He fiddled with his hands, and he tried to calm himself. His hands. Skinny, weak…they were just small. Smaller than a boy of his size should be. His face gaunt, and dirty, with protruding jawbones, and cheek-bones. He was just unhealthy, in a way that it seemed he had been for quite a while.

The little boy slowly pointed to the hot dogs, speaking rather hesitantly. He didn’t much like to speak, but this person was bigger than him, and could help him. So, he moved closer to him, and pointed lightly.

“F..food. I want..that food.”

He knew he couldn’t really get it himself, all the people were in the way, and they kept pushing him down. He had very dark black hair, though it might be a little bit lighter if he’d bathed recently, and grey eyes. It was an odd color, but that was not why his eyes might draw attention. His eyes drew attention because they were sad…scared…lost. All of the above. But not once did he ask where his mother was. He knew that this person wouldn’t know where his mother was, for he didn’t even know his mother was still alive.

[DR JASPER ANVIL]

Jasper looked down at the kid, who just gasped for food. Poor thing, most likely had not eaten in a while. Jasper simply did not understand how people could walk past a weeping child that way, and not care. Especially not, since sometimes cops patroled the area. He knew the cops around here were mostly corrupt, but even a corrupt officer should care for a child, and if it was just to maintain his camouflage. He nodded a bit and padded the boy's shoulder. "Okay, I'll get you some..." he said then and got up.

He slowly walked over to the booth. Usually he would have used one of his faked idenities, like one from the health office, but in this case. He was almost immideately recognized by the salesman. "Now, now, if thats not Jasper. I'm surprised you dont have three legs now after that case with nuclear waste..." he joked, and made a gesture for the guy to come closer. "Hmm, I have to admit you look much better than last time I visited..." he answered, and caused Jeff, the stand owner, to frown. he was not used to compliments, and the fact that Jasper did not return the playful insult. "Eeeeh... thank you." he replied then, and Jasper made a gesture as shoving an invisible object away. "I was talking to the hot dogs..." "Oh." Jasper opened his wallet and took some pieces of paper out, smacking them onto the table. "Give me two of them, a package of fries, and a salad... oh and a cola." he ordered, and the stand owner immideately saluted. "Yes, boss." he added and went busy. Only two minutes later, he handed Jasper the stuff and a tablet. Well, the tablet had a logo of a near hotel, but Jasper didnt care about small thievery.

He returned to the boy with the goods, and sat down on the edge of the pavement, putting down the tablet besides him, and gesturing the boy to sit down at the other side of the tablet. "Here we go, pal." he said and smiled.

[MICHAEL MATTHIAS WINSTON]

Michael was rather starving. He looked towards the male with the food and he stared at it. He didn’t really…ask before he started eating. He just…started. The food was really good…especially since he hadn’t eaten in a while. He didn’t use any manners, and he hadn’t spoken too much to the male, but he did try to drink the cola, and spit it out, looking rather upset.

He’d never had anything like cola before, and it seemed that the spiciness on his toungue made him upset. He actually threw the bottle of soda. His being upset at the drink actually caused the surrounding buildings to simultaneously lose power. He assumed that the drink was made by one of them. His eyes were weird at this point. Black…with green numbers scrolling across them. They were numbers…all zero’s and ones. There were people looking around for some kind of cause to the outage. It went beyond the buildings, it went on to include the cell phones in the surrounding area, and the other electronic devices. They just…stopped working. It was because of Michael of course.

His eyes slowly faded back to his original color, but he still seemed to be quite upset.

[DR JASPER ANVIL]

Jasper was a bit surprised, which proved to be a bit of an underestimation. He had seen alot of strange events happening in his life or his investigations, given the paranormal was one of his specialities. But -whatever that was- was definately quite a shock for the P.I. aswell. Did the boy cause so much destruction all by himself? Intentionally? Or was ist maybe a side effect of something else? Jasper caught himself staring for a while, as people ran around rather confused and screaming. Is SPECTRE experimenting with bioweapons again? Now using poor children for experiments? were his first thoughts. He knew that he had taken out that organisation before, but they were like a zombie, they always came back. Or was the child maybe someone like him? The kind of descendant from a family with a... gift... inherited from real ancient traits?

A scream ripped Jasper from his thoughts, as the chaos around him was still byond belief. He had to do something. Preferably something before a large number of cops arrived. He rummaged in his bag, through his number of fake identities, then drew out a badge, and climbed atop of a cafe table. "Old City Power Plant" he shouted then as loud as he could, showing the faked identity. "Thank you everybody for having participated in our latest experiment: High Voltage in daily life." he continued shouting, and most of the people stopped running around, instead crowding around Jasper and shouting things at him. "Of course we will gladly pay for any damage caused. Just report to our complaints office immideately... they are instructed to compensate you..."

The sudden rush of people was even surprising Jasper. Once he had said that, almost everyone quickly strode towards the subway station, shouting alot of curses, using elbows or grabs to get a better position in the crowd.

Jasper phewed and jumped down from the table, looking down at the child. "I really need to buy an extra large amount of backup fuses when you are close, eh?" he said then, with a slight smile, taking the bag with the remaining food. "Come on, we better get away from here, before they realize the complaints office is closed today..."

[MICHAEL MATTHIAS WINSTON]

Michael looked at jasper, still wiping his mouth, watching him talk to all these people. He was staring, so of course he wasn’t finishing the food. As jasper came back over, holding onto the bad with the food, Michael was lightly shaking.

He did not like people. This was the honest to god truth. People made him uncomfortable, and a whole crowd of them was also most likely not the best thing in the world for him. He did note that jasper was holding his food though, and stood up, holding his hands out for the bag. It was clear that he did not trust jasper enough to let him take away his food. He’d not had a lot in recent times, and jasper was taking the only sizable amount.

He didn’t much care for the comment jasper made, pertaining to his power, because it singled him out again. He did not like getting this singled out. The boy wiped his hands along his pants before reaching out for the bag again. He wanted it. His food, right? This was his.

“I…I want the food…” He mumbled, just intended for jasper.

[DR JASPER ANVIL]

They walked through some alleys to cover their tracks. The boy was mainly busy trying to grab for the bag, but Jasper did not really notice, he was too busy thinking about what had just happened. A part of him had alot of physical formulas in mind, another part was more worried about the effect he had just seen, which definately had not been just a light disturbance in the force... eh... power supply. After a short while, he was sure noone would follow them, as they entered a small backyard, which had a little -rather old- fountain, a bench, and some trees.

Suddenly the boy tugged at him and talked about the food bag. Jasper had already forgotten he was still carrying it, and smiled. He crouched next to the boy and looked into his eyes. "Oh, here it is, little one. But can you please try eating without wrecking the street? It tends to attract peoples attention if you blow up their mobile phones, you know? So... you have your food and stay calm?" he asked then and handed the bag back, while taking the half full bottle of cola for himself, just to make sure the city was still standing when the sun rose. Old City, your local ruins in the neighborhood... he definately did not want that to happen.

Jasper sat down on the bench and watched the fountain, while he thought more about what just happened. If the boy was a bioweapon, then he at least did not act like one, at least not yet... and his powers did not seem to affect the living, otherwise Jasper would have withnessed a torch festival of self ignition. "Do you maybe want to tell me your name, pal? Where are you parents?" he asked then in a soft voice. The boy definately seemed to be in a bad psychic state.

[MICHAEL MATTHIAS WINSTON]

He took the food greedily, shoving it into his mouth. He’d obviously not had such food in a long time…perhaps a bit too long for a boy of his age. He didn’t know how to interact with the male…this was a strong person, and the person had been able to lead him to a different place, so he’d be cautious.

The food was almost gone when the male asked for his name. He swallowed down the food remaining quickly and wiped his lips. He stared at this person for a while. Should he say it? What about his needing to stay hidden. Michael bit his lip hard, and then slowly spoke. “M…Michael.” None of the other questions were answered. He didn’t know most of them, and it was hard to just suddenly speak only in English. He knew it well enough, but it was still different.

[DR JASPER ANVIL]

Jasper had sit down on the bench, next to the boy, and watched him eat. There was no need to talk. Something inside of Jasper told him there was no need to. Instead, for some minutes, the man tried to follow all those implications the current situation gave, on a virtual map deep inside his mind. That boy definately created a whole maze of questions, and thinking about one opened countless new paths. After he had downed the whole food -quite an astonishing amount for a young one like him- he finally decided to say something, which appeared to be his name.

Jasper smiled. "Micheal? Really? That is a wonderful name. My uncle was named Micheal too... and I had a few friends with that name." he said then with a smile. On the other side of the small backyard was a little abstract fountain, labled "the pissing poodles". Jasper was rather happy it actually was very abstract, as he preferred it to a fountain actually living that name. Still, that fountain looked like it had been created by a computer just during Micheal's... outburst? whatever it was? In that moment, Jasper was happy that his mobile phone had just died, and not tried to sound an opera of Frank Sinatra combined with the Kelly Family and a bad interpretation of country roads. Or patch him through to the president... or that blonde film star from the show with the ring... he always forgot the name...

Jasper waited a bit longer, then he tried again with a very soft and comforting voice. "But Micheal, a child like you should not be all alone here in these hostile streets. Dont you have anybody who cares for you?". It was probably hard to care for a child who was the horror of any live baseball broadcast...