Anyone with any sense or money has already left the city, because it's obvious that this is where people are most likely to just - disappear. Population centers. This one isn't by executive order, at least not from this country, though Vernon's heard people muttering that it's the Russians. There are things taking them. Dark, circular portals that just snatch people out of their beds at night, or spew forth giant birds, or gargoyles, or flying saucers, or fairies or whatever the hell else, to drag people into the portals they come from, or sometimes just to torment them.

His dad was one of those that disappeared in the night. At the time, it had seemed like he ran out on his son, but now with so much time to think, it doesn't really make sense. See, he'd left the money. Vernon had kind of thought he'd maybe gotten too drunk one night, died in a ditch somewhere, but. No body. This aspect of his disappearance was important for Vernon, because this way, the medical discharge checks kept coming. It maybe made him a bad person, but, well. He sure didn't correct that with anyone that he maybe should have. He wanted to make something of himself, and the local manufacturing industry has been drying up, so realistically he'd be better off with a high school diploma. So he never cleared up his dad's status. Eventually, he'd always thought. Just finish high school. Until then, he'd keep his head down, pay the rent for this shitty apartment on time, and definitely, definitely do nothing to disturb any of the ponderous workings of the United States Government. He was perfectly happy to pretend that the absentee father was definitely still around, just hungover on the couch somewhere or something.

They were strange, if practical, priorities in what were becoming troubling times, but these troubling times were going rather well for Vernon in particular. For one, money went farther this way; he had more financial sense than his old man, and didn't spend any on cigarettes or whisky. For another - well, there were a lot of reasons Vernon didn't particularly miss his dad, okay, and he'll leave it at that.

Being without his dad is lucky now, too, really. Vernon doesn't want to guess what his father might've done, but if there's anything he knows about the bastard, it's that he always made everything worse. Alone is better than with him, by a long shot.

Alone is probably his best option, actually. He could shout loud enough that someone could find him, but he's not in any kind of state to defend himself. He's heard some of his neighbors muttering things about how it was those people causing all of this. They're with the Russians, they're with the government, they're alien invaders impersonating people. No one's going to miss white trash like him, and this rough neighborhood is becoming rougher all the time. Between that and the government, he'll just take his chances with the bathtub, thanks. Rent and utilities are already paid for the month, and while some of his teachers might notice his absence, he doubts it'll be remarked upon.

Just another mysterious disappearance, in a world that's filled with far too many of them, lately.

He gets good at turning the tub's faucet on and off at his level of coordination. There isn't much else to do, while he waits for his affliction's time to be up. No point in wasting water, he does still have to pay for the usage at the end of the month, if he lives, and he plans to. Eventually, he gets hungry and bored enough to drag himself to the kitchen, and manages to get the pantry cabinet open. He doesn't tend to stock a lot of food, and boy does he regret it now. There's not much on offer. Getting into the peanut butter would be amazing, but it's up too high, and anyway, he's not sure he could manage to get the twist off top as he is. The bread's more doable; it's both lower, and within reach of his motor capabilities. He knocks it off the shelf and then opens it with his teeth, and it helps with the hunger. He could head back to the bathroom, but eh, he's already here. No reason not to try for the peanut butter. A stubborn and starving teenager with nothing else to do with his time can manage to eventually knock it down, and then getting the twist top off is downright easy in comparison.

There aren't any easy answers for the other end of his digestion system, unfortunately. The less said about it, the better. He does what he can, but he's not getting this apartment's safety deposit back.

It's a miserable, boring, and miserably boring week, but he makes it to the other end alive.

Eventually, coordination languidly returns to his limbs, and the first thing he does is scarf down half of the contents of the fridge, which had been quite impenetrable to him before.

The second thing he does is have the longest shower of his life.

Then he looks at himself in the mirror, shaking and afraid of what his life is going to be like, now. Is. Is he going to be one of the obvious ones? Is he going to need to buy hair dye to pass for a normal human? He can't tell yet, his hair's not purple or anything. His eyes weren't this color, before, but the green they are isn't too unnatural, or even too far off from what they'd once been. They just - shine a little strangely, in the wrong kind of direct light. He... otherwise looks like himself. More symmetrical, maybe. Prettier, he guesses. But not inhuman. Okay. Good. He can probably pass, as long as no one shines a flashlight directly at him, or he gets some sunglasses.

He's not sure if anyone is even going to notice, which. Is fine by him.

He bags his ruined clothes and throws them out, along with the spoiled food and the mess he'd made during his - his week of Hell. That's what he'll be calling it. Hellweek. Nice and memorable, because it sucked a bunch. The rest of the clothes still fit okay enough, though he needs to steal one of his dad's belts and cut a new hole in it for the pants.

Vernon's supposed to have magic powers now, or something. He. Doesn't really want to deal with that right now.

Instead he goes and he gets the mail. There's only one bill, which he carefully forges a check for in his father's name. Then he's... what time is it. 5 PM? And... a Thursday. Yeah, okay, then he's getting a damn burger. If he's sure of anything, it's that he's not going to school tomorrow; Monday would make more sense if he's going back at all, say he got sick and his dad was a bum and didn't call it in or something, but. He doesn't know if he will. He doesn't even know what his plans are anymore. Which is funny, because he had a lot of time to think about it, but mostly what he was thinking was about which parts of the kitchen he could manage to break into without making enough noise to summon the neighbors, or how likely it was that he's going to disappear into a government facility forever.

He goes to the closest place that he can get a burger from. It's the best burger he's had in his absolute life, and he eats it and the associated fries with a speed that frightens some onlookers.

His power - and he doesn't think that part was made up, anymore, he does feel like he has a magic something, besides the better senses and the eyes that see better in the dark - he thinks it has something to do with people. There's a something, when they look at him, at the edge of his mind, like a new muscle he could flex in response. He doesn't. Something that has to do with other people? Yeah, that'll sure keep him under the government's radar. Not alarming and suspicious at all, no dissection imminent in regards to that. He'll just never, ever touch it, how about. He'll just go home, pretend he came down with something ordinary. Make up the week of missed work, try to graduate high school before the US military finds out his dad's probably been eaten by an alien.

Live a normal life, like he'd planned before.

He spends his Friday grocery shopping, getting more food than he usually does, and splurging for some much needed cleaning supplies. Then it's forging a note from his dad, about how he came down with, hmm, how about mono. That's plausibly something that'd have him out for a week, and he'd gone to school on Thursday. Missing a Friday for a sick day that turned into a week is pretty explicable.

Saturday he deep cleans the apartment, because - because. It needed it, okay. Picking up heavy things is easier than it had been, he notices as he's taking out the trash, which is pretty cool, he guesses.

And on his way back from the dumpster, he sees just the hint of a red glow, barely noticeable, from an alleyway.

... He stops, detours, and then he peeks around the corner.

Impossibly black circle. Red ring. Swaying and crackling ominously. Yeah, uh. That's a portal. Within a block of his apartment.

This is maybe perhaps a problem.

.......

To his credit, he does not immediately go in.

He tries calling the police about it, first.

They know about it already, apparently. Thank him for his time. Ask him for his name, and he refuses to give it and instead hangs up.

Vernon is aware of what neighborhood he's in, and what color the skin of his neighbors tends to come in. How much money they have, and how important they are to the people with power to make safe. The important people left, already. It's just the people that can't, now.

He wonders if anyone is going to even bother to try to save them.

Also to his credit: he gets his dad's gun, first. He's known where the key for the safe was for a while; he was the one who pushed for his dad to even have a safe at all. A sixteen year old should maybe not be carrying a firearm, but one of the few positive memories he has of his father is being taught how to shoot, and it's safer than going without, whatever his special snowflake magical power is.

But it'll probably work on monsters as well as people, too. He knows which he'd rather test it out on.

In he goes, and if this means he's just another nobody who disappears, then fine. He'll disappear without regrets.

Once he's inside, he feels - that something is about to look at him, and he knows that he doesn't want it to. He flexes the not-muscle, and the eyes of the goblin-like creature that had begun to look in his direction pass over him, as if he isn't even there. The pressure? strain? fades, a little, when its gaze averts.

... huh.

He steps carefully out of its line of sight, crouches behind a - what is this, a medieval barrel? - and it's easy. Nothing's looking at him at all. Nothing knows he's there.

It's not clear why he's so sure of that, but he is.

... Yeah, okay. He can work with this.

A point blank shot to the head from behind kills it just fine, but the sound - that causes the something he's not-exactly-flexing to come under strain. He... attracted attention with a gunshot. Ah. Yes, that makes sense. And now something is coming, and it's coming from that direction. Like heat, from off of a fire, he can... feel... the potential weight of perception, growing not-exactly-warmer but bearing its potential weight down, all the same. He should be elsewhere.

He moves elsewhere. Quick, quiet, out of sight.

His hands feel numb. Clumsy. Like - hellweek. Like that. Not to that level, but just enough, that twitch of clumsiness in his usually very dexterous digits.

Okay. So - that's what the cost of magic is, he supposes. And the week was to, what, pay to get it at all? Show him how bad it can get? That makes some degree of sense, he supposes.

Vernon (clumsily, for him) reloads the empty chamber, then holsters his father's revolver, and considers his options. Gun: bad and loud, for emergencies only. He could maybe sneak past everything, but then how does he get anyone in here out?

The goblin-like-thing investigating its deceased fellow leaves.

... Well, they're armed, aren't they.

He picks up the dead goblin-thing's spear, snaps most of the handle off so it's something a bit more wieldable-by-a-teenager, and - eh, he doesn't have a sheath, and neither do they, so he'll just hold onto it for now. Note to self for the future: acquire knife with sheath. Silent weaponry is apparently important to him in particular, now.

Onward, he guesses, because he'd like to rescue at least somebody that's in here, or he'll feel even more stupid than he already does.

Okay, so. Stabbing a goblin-thing: significantly more unpleasant than shooting it. Also much more efficient, and his - power - gives him a feel for where he should and should not be, to avoid being spotted. There are places that feel bad to be, and places that do not, and if he avoids the former and is very careful about how he steps, it's not hard. Actually, it's straightforward, and downright trivial, and his newfound strength extends to melee combat just fine. He might not have been able to pull this off before he spent a week as an unhappy lump in his dad's apartment, but he sure can, now.

His aim's a bit garbage, though, and. Wow is it messy. He's also much more up close and personal with making this creature-thing be dead, which. Is probably eliciting an emotion of some kind? Maybe? But then he thinks about the number of people that disappear into these fucking things every day, and even if he feels a bit sick from the personally inflicted violence, well. He spent a week starving in his own shit, he'd kind of like it to have been worth literally anything at all. He wants to not have done nothing when he could have kept his neighbors from getting dragged off.