It has been found that it is often on days of fair weather when the most drastic and shocking events of one's life tend to occur. On the day things changed, the day his view of the world was flipped on its head and thrown in a blender, the weather was amazing.
It was mid-morning and Jack had been riding the passenger train for about two hours now. He had some cheap earbuds in and was listening to some generic rock band on his old iPod as he stared out at the passing countryside. The train they were traveling on was a bit older in style, nice and cozy with lots of polished wood present throughout. Mike, the foster care agent in charge of escorting him to his next home, sat beside him reading a newspaper. The man stood somewhere above six feet, with blond hair, piercing blue eyes, and a kind face. Mike wasn't the first foster care agent he'd met, but he was definitely one of the nicer ones. Though he was a bit odd, the man couldn't have been older than thirty but his suit, while still professional, looked like it was from the seventies.
Apparently, this next foster home that agreed to take him in was in California, specifically somewhere around the LA area. He wasn't expecting much, he'd been in and out of foster homes for as long as he could remember and didn't think he'd be staying at this one long.
Jack cursed as his earbuds, or maybe his iPod started mixing his music with static. That kinda thing tended to happen a lot around Jack, tech just seemed to forget how to work. Though, admittedly, it seemed to only happen to things that required electricity of some sort. That was why he was using a shitty iPod and cheap earbuds, he had been betting that one or both of them would be busted by the end of the day. Well that, and he didn't exactly have any money for anything better.
Putting his iPod away, he stood up and stretched before speaking.
"Well, I'm going up to the food cart if that's alright?"
Mike looked up from his paper before speaking.
"Of course, shouldn't be an issue, just be safe, I'll be here."
"Alright, I'll be back."
He made his way through the aisle heading toward the front of the train where the food car was. On his way, he noticed that there weren't very many people. Not unusual due to the distinct drop in popularity that long-distance passenger trains have had since other options became available. Though, as he passed by he did notice that one of the passengers was rather strange. It was an older-looking man with a mess of shoulder-length jet-black hair. His clothes were dirty and he wore a disheveled Hawaiian T-shirt. The way he was sitting looked like he was simultaneously trying to slouch and sit up straight, and failing at both. The man was also constantly twitching, with his head continuously rolling back and forth, his eyes hidden behind a pair of darkly tinted aviators.
Jack didn't realize he had been staring at the man until, with another twitch, the man was suddenly looking straight at him. There was a brief moment, no more than a fraction of a second when it seemed like they locked eyes despite his aviators. With a little jump at the suddenness of the attention, Jack immediately looked away and hurried further along the train. He was so quick, that he didn't catch when the man's mouth slowly curled into a vicious grin. Or when the man, in his sporadic and twitchy manner, stood up to follow.