A an alarm clock Loudly began to ring at 6:00 in the morning.
A black haired boy with a Japanese complexation, woke up in his bed in a strange position. One leg was outside of his blanket, and his head was nearly falling off the bed. It's cause? A terrible sleep cycle.
He stretched out his hand in an attempt to turn it off, but he fell out of bed instead, knocking over a cabinet causing the clock too fall and break.
"..."
He weakly got up from the floor, stretching his back before finally getting ready for the day. Brushing teeth, a quick morning shower and a nice change into a pair of fresh clothes, followed by a breakfast of toast, and egg and 2 pieces of bacon.
The boy looked at his wrist as he checked the time on his watch, seeing that it was now 7:00 am.
He picked up his Beige jumper on the couch and shoved it on, followed by a black bag and a pair of white shoes. Then finally he took his first steps outside.
Akira walked out of his home, being introduced to a typical Apartment complex. He casually walked down the stairs, across all 23 floors until he made it back down to the bottom.
'I leave the house, take the sonic train, go to school, then the café, and come right back home. This unbreakable cycle I've managed to maintain won't be broken now!'
This was his routine. It was something he considered very precious to him, much like how someone would value a treasured object. Without it, Akira had nothing.
His phone in his pocket began to vibrate rampantly until he then pulled it out and turned it on. He had received 20+ messages from a guy named Lebanon.
They all said the same thing, "GOOD MORNING BEST BUDDY! >:D"
Akira just fired a quick text telling him to shut it.
Lebanon was a Borrower Akira had met last year upon coming to this city. The two encountered each other at their usual café, where they've been close friends ever since.
He walked down onto a relatively normal path way, down a normal road, in a normal housing district. The only thing that seemed slightly out of place was the floating trash can that would move up and down the street as well the other robotic street cleaners.
After 10 minutes of walking, he eventually arrived at Babel train station. By keeping his perfect routine, as well as relying on the perfect timing of the train, every time he arrived, the train would perfectly be waiting there for him. All this meticulously planned for his perfect day. Nothing could go wrong.
A white smooth train had its doors open, with very few people getting on, and even less leaving. Akira quickly got on, and urgently grabbed onto a handle bar. The second he did, the doors closed and the message to depart had appeared.
The sonic train began to slowly float, before suddenly accelerating to Mach 2 in 2 seconds.
Thanks to the energy brought into the world by borrowers, advancements in technology unrestrained by energy had been created. One such creation was the sonic train, the fastest public transport that exists in the world.
While the train sped down the street, a rocket from all the way across the city could be seen taking flight. It was the Red star, a ship that was also a product of borrower coexistence. It was likely heading towards the colony on mars.
After several stops, the train finally arrived at the Babel central city station at 7:45. Although he only had 15 minutes, he was confident in arriving on time. This was a cycle he had repeated hundreds of times, after all.
The city was reminiscent of the Tokyo square, but it also felt like New York. Several tall buildings of brick and glass reached high into the sky, littered in billboards advertising new products and technology.
"Oh.. they finally released that game. Forever frontier. I guess I'll try it if I get a chance."
He continued to walk down past the the mall until he arrived at the Babel city bank which frequently got robbed. Unsurprisingly it was getting robbed today too. This time it appeared there were three of them today.
There were 5 police cars stationed around the banks entrance, with several armed officers aiming silver guns at the entrance. One singular officer stood out from the rest however. He wore a long brown detectives coat, with a chiselled face and some facial hair. He was even smoking.
As Akira tried to walk around it, he chuckled.
"Smoking on the job again? Your going to die before you even get fired."
"S- Shut up! Just let me do my job here! Waiting for them to come out every time is annoying! If it wasn't for the damn procedure I would've gone in already!"
This was Elodie Moreau. A man of French descent who became an officer in Babel city. Due to how often Akira walked down this street, and the frequent robbery of this bank, the two became well acquainted.
"See you tomorrow?"
"Go on! Get outta here kid!"
He quickly walked off. Even though he was confident he was safe, you can never be to prepared.
Suddenly, the entrance to the bank exploded as bits of debris and glass flew everywhere. All the Officers began to shoot at the dust cloud simultaneously but a giant green mass jumped out of it. It landed on the side of a building, before jumping down onto the road and running away.
It had 6 arms which acted as legs much like a spiders, with the mask of a crow at its front. 2 figures were riding it, one had a machine gun on his back, and the other was shirtless and skinny. They both wore dusty masks and goggles and were carrying bags filled with cash.
"GET DOWN!", Elodie screamed while backing down behind a police car.
One of the robbers on the green monsters back, pulled out his machine gun and opened fire on them all. All the officers had gotten down safely, and any citizens nearby were also running away.
In Babel, crime had also evolved. Borrowers stemmed from humans, and so their greed had evolved too with their bodies. As they took and took, humans saw them with fear, leading them to be one of the many causes of the flickering war.
But in turn, borrowers with a stronger sense of justice also rose up to counter them. Borrowers who would use their powers in the name of peace, to show the humans that they can coexist. These were known as Returners.
A green haired man wearing half of a green kimono was running atop a building in parallel of the green creature. Somehow he was keeping up with the monsters speed that could even rival a sports car.
The green haired man, jumped down in front of it, and prepared to draw his katana as the green creature moved over him.
"Flow control: flowing sword."
A blue energy in the atmosphere began to warp around the man into a large 10 metre wide circle encasing the monsters inside it. He quickly drew his sword, and instantly cut the wrists of all 6 of its hands.
This was the might of Returner Ranked 65th, Toru Yakushima.
The monster fell over, causing the two people on top it to fall.
Strangely, the monster began to melt into a green liquid, revealing the person hidden inside. He was also wearing punk like clothing just like the other two.
While everyone else ran, Akira was a little slower. This was the first time any criminal Borrowers had gotten this close to him. His heart grew heavy as his movements slowed, and a memory he so desperately wanted to forget began to surface.
He was young, yet somehow he found himself surrounded by corpses. He tried to walk back but then he slipped and fell into a puddle of blood. When he looked at his own hand, the red stains made him shriek.
Disgust, fear, anxiety. He felt all these things.
He quickly tried to get back up and run away, yet when he did someone blocked his path. His entire body seemed to be blocked out by the darkness, but there was one feature of his that was very noticeable, and that was the bloody red Oni Mask he wore.
The Returner slowly walked over to the three, examining them in the process.
"2 borrowers and 1 human? All from the Black Bone gang no less. I don't understand why we haven't annihilated you guys yet."
The one human with a machine gun screamed as he quickly got back up to fire. Waves of countless bullets flew towards the Returner, but he cut them all down with relative ease.
The other Junker crew member panicked. If he didn't do anything then they would get caught, and lose all the money that they had just stolen. He looked around, and noticed Akira who was frozen from fear.
He reached his hand out towards him, and strangely it began to stretch at a fast speed. Akira snapped out of his trance and started to run, but the hand quickly grabbed onto his hood before dragging him back.
"Sorry kid! But I'm not interested in getting dragged back to that trash dump of a city!"
He trapped Akira in a headlock, while also preparing to snap his neck at any given moment. Akira tried to force himself out, but despite being skinny, this guy was pretty strong. Akira was only human, but this man was a Borrower. The physical difference between the two was unsurprising to him, and yet he had to try anyway.
The barrels of the machine gun slowly turned red, before evolving into a burning yellow colour as it started to overheat. In fear of his weapon breaking, the human stopped firing. Toru on the other hand had to halt.
"YEAH! I HAVE A HOSTAGE SO YOU HAVE TO LITSEN TO MY DEMANDS! WERE GONNA GO INTO THAT SEWAR OVER THERE WITH ALL THIS CASH, AND YOUR GOING TO DO ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!"
The returner let out a groan as he scratched the back of his head.
"How troublesome..."
All of a sudden another returner wearing a black jacket and a maroon shirt teleported next to him. His eyelids were closed, yet sharp, and he carried a weak smile.
"Toru? Your struggling with this trash?"
"Yeah, I'm not really built to handle this kind of situation. You take it from here, Genma."
"This is why your ranked lower than me. Your too lazy."
Genma teleported behind the last Borrower, grabbed onto Akira and then teleported back to Toru in less than a second. The two criminals were incredibly stunned at the speed of his recovery.
The human quickly realized that without a hostage, they would be caught. So the least he could do was take out as many as he could. He aimed his gun at a faraway crowd and was about to fire, but Genma teleported in front of it.
"I can't let you do that."
He lightly touched the gun before teleporting it away somewhere random. The human took a step back, but then the Returner punched him in the gut, knocking him out in one hit. He collapsed to the floor, struggling to breathe and eventually passed out.
The remaining gang member tried to stretch his hands towards the top of a nearby building, and planned to escape by jumping over it, but Genma teleported right in front of him. Genma lightly opened his eyes, revealing his empty eye sockets which contained only darkness.
"Where are you going?"
The criminal screamed in fear, but Genma grabbed him by the forehead, before picking him up and smashing him into the ground, shattering the concrete floor as well as his skull.
This was the overpowering, Returner ranked 59th, Genma.
The onlooking crowd cheered in victory as the Returners had prevented yet another bank robbery. This was just another average day in Babel.
Akira however was completely frozen. Although this was the average day for everyone else, this was the first time since coming here that he got caught up in an incident like this.
Suddenly, Toru slapped him on the back.
"Cheer up kid. You weren't in any real danger as long as we were around."
"Careful, your going to scare him more than he already is.", Toru whispered towards him, But Akira was too drowned in his own thoughts to care.
'It wasn't supposed to be like this. It wasn't supposed to be like this. It wasn't supposed to be like this. It wasn't supposed to be like this. It wasn't supposed to be like this. It wasn't supposed to be like this. It wasn't supposed to be like this. It wasn't supposed to be like this. It wasn't supposed to be like this. It wasn't supposed to be like this. It wasn't supposed to be like this. It wasn't supposed to be like this. It wasn't supposed to be like this. It wasn't supposed to be like this. It wasn't supposed to be like this.'
He was too devoured in his own thoughts to even recognise being talked too. The repetitive rhythm in his life he had prepared so much for, had been broken. And yet, he remembered he needed to get to school.
He quickly sprinted off without even thanking his saviours. Maybe if he could get there in time, then everything would be okay. Toru just looked at him strangely as he ran off.
"Did I really scare him??"