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Sweet Jazz City! A bustling metropolis where it snowed 7 months of the year. The chill of august was beginning to seep into the air. Businessmen and socialites alike walk around the clamoring city without a care in the world. None worried in the slightest, all enjoying the last days of summer. Well, all except for one. A young girl stands at the corner of an intersection, looking around like the sole lookout for a high-level heist.
“Where are they…?”
Zora Salazar has been standing there for around 20 minutes. At least, that’s what everyone else saw. After maybe 5 minutes, the girl used her epithet to speed up time, making it take more like 12 minutes. She’s never been able to wait for long, so a time-based epithet was a godsend. It was Tuesday, which meant that today Zora had an afternoon off. Zora has a strange schedule. She works at a dig site a while out of town, so in order for her to get to school on time she has to wake up ridiculously early. On top of that, she manages the site on her own. The school compromised with her and allowed her to only go to school on even days, and work on odd days. This led to her missing a lot of schoolwork that she had to catch up on. All around, she has very little free time, which makes days like this so special. Her friends do their best to capitalize on this and organize hangouts. That’s what they were doing today. If they ever show up that is.
At this point the girl is worried. She can’t think of any good reason for them to be so late. Did something happen to them? Are they hurt?
The child takes a moment to breathe. She can just ask for help! That’s what Ztreet Zmarts says to do. The old show gives kids various advice for dealing with the dangers of the streets. One of the tidbits is that you can ask a stranger for help when lost. And there’s only a small chance they’re actually a murderer! Zora brings time back to normal and looks around for someone. There! A man wearing a yellow pinstripe suit and a matching hat is walking toward her. She’s just about to stop him when a voice calls out from a nearby ally. It was a familiar voice. A voice she knows. From a person she knows.
“Stop! Please, stop it!”
Zora dashed into the indigo alleyways.
~~~
Charles Foxtrot was so excited to meet her friends at the beach, that she took a shortcut. Taking a route through alleys to avoid traffic. She figures the best way to get to the beach is to go directly west. Her blonde and pink color palette is a stark contrast to the shadowy blues of the alleys. She skipped through like a lost rabbit.
It wasn’t long before a wolf showed up.
“Hey, kid.”
“Hello!” Charles responds with full sincerity. Someone is talking to her! Kids at school always avoided her for some reason, all of them except for her two best friends.
“That’s a nice-looking bag you got there.” Charles looks down at her bag. It was nice! It was baby pink with magenta hearts hand embroidered across the strap.
“Why thank you. I like your…” Charles was always told to return a compliment. She looked up and down at the person addressing her for anything compliment-worthy. The woman was languid with pasty skin and a long, ratty auburn ponytail. Her clothes are stained and torn, fitting right in with the surroundings. She leaned against the wall in an awkward way, like a dead tree that couldn’t decide whether or not it wanted to fall down. “I like your energy,” she decided.
“Looks expensive.”
“It took all my allowance,” she responded. “Well, goodbye!” The wolf slid in front of the exit before the child could escape.
“I’d like one of my own.”
“Well you can go to Baxter's Department Store, that’s where I got mine.” She explained.
“I could. But I think I’d prefer that one right there,” the wolf pointed down at the bag.
“But this one is mine.”
“Not for long.” A glint of light and a switchblade appeared in the wolf’s hand.
~~~
Zora raced around the corner, trying to get to her friend as fast as possible. Unfortunately, she has yet to figure out how to actually make herself faster. She’s tried, but the closest she got was how fast each step takes. But that takes way too much focus and stamina. Zora peeks around the wall and gasps. Her best friend is being whipped back and forth by some scraggly mugger. A mugger! The assailant shook her up and down, desperately trying to knock her loose, but Charles clung to the bag’s strap as though her life depended on it.
“Kid, just let go!” Barked the wolf.
“No! I won’t!” The kid refused to give up.
“Gh… if I tear the straps or rip the fabric I can’t sell it.” She brought her knife up to the child’s neck. “Is this bag really worth your life?”
“The bag doesn’t matter, but I can’t let you have what’s in it!”
“Huh, something valuable? What is it, money?” The mugger swung Charles back and threw her into the air. The force alone broke her apart from the precious bag. Charles flew through the air, and Zora immediately ran to her aid. Zora reached into her soul and latched onto her epithet, Sundial, to slow down the fall. The last few inches of the fall take almost an entire minute. When the bag hit the ground, its contents spilled out. However, instead of the multicolored bills the mugger expected, out came several handmade friendship bracelets. All are unique with their own specific colors and patterns.
“No! Those were for my friends! But now they’re all ruined. The mud will never come out” Charles lamented, much more concerned with the bracelets than her safety. “Oh, Zora! I’m sorry! These were going to be a surprise for you all.”
“Oh Charles, don’t worry about that. Let’s just get out of here.”
“You aren’t going anywhere.” The wolf recovered from her small shock, upset over the muddied bag. “You just cost me full price on that bag. And no one leaves till you someone covers the difference!”
“Back off.”
A new voice rang through the alleyway. This one is lower and flat. The mugger flipped around to see who the intruder was. A third child stood at the entrance. Taller than the other two, his shadow extended all the way to the wolf’s feet. His face was tilted down, covered in shadows.
“Great, another one? The mugger rolled her eyes. “Get out of here kid, if you know what’s good for you.” The mugger flashed the switchblade as a warning.
“Hm, if you had any sense, you’d be the one running.”
The mugger squinted. The boy has razzberry pink hair, with a single streak of white running through. He wears a white button-up with a neon green bow tie. A torn backpack hangs over one shoulder, the thing clearly a hand me down. By all accounts, he should look ridiculous. But there was something about the way he moved. The way he wasn’t moving. Stock still, like a crack on a television screen. He spoke again.
“You’re rather confident, I can assume these are your stomping grounds, right? That means I don’t have to explain the name Roughhouse to you … right?”
Roughhouse?
Of course, she knew the name Roughhouse, any street punk worth their salt knows it. They’re a family of criminals that dominated the shadows of Sweet Jazz City a while back. But at this point, they’re more like urban legends.
The rumor is the eldest siblings are a pair of twins that are nigh indestructible. The brother is said to have once gotten his face torn open, then pummeled the punks who did it and walked himself to the hospital. The twin sister has a strong telekinesis despite being a mundie and knocks buildings onto people. The rumor there is she can command an army of ghosts -but no one knows how. The second oldest was a bomb junkie. Word on the street was he wound up in prison after bombing the STEM building. Then there was the girl who went around smashing stuff with a giant baseball bat, and the girl with an epithet who could turn you into her slave for the rest of your life. But those were just rumors! Stories that thugs told little thugling to scare them straight at night. Backstreet boogymen! They aren’t real.
“Yeah, what does Roughhouse have to do with anything?” The wolf spat.
“Oh, it’s got a lot to do with me,” the little boy declares, “after all, I’m one of them.”
Xerxes Roughhouse.
He steps forward and lifts his head so the mugger can finally see his face. His eyes are deep-set and impossibly black. They look like two pieces of brimstone. And deeper in those eyes is a glint. A glint of light that promises pain. The mugger was just as still as the two girls below her.
“That’s horse baloney!” She eventually managed to choke out. “I hear them Roughhouses are all in their teens at least! They don’t have any kid brother.”
“That’s news to me,” Xerxes responded, his tone not betraying any emotion. The wolf checked behind her. She isn’t being flanked, just her two marks on the ground. Did they know this boy?
“There’s a reason you know.”
“Huh?”
“Why you’ve never heard of me, there’s a reason. The thing is, all my siblings have a reputation. That’s because people see what they do. When they fight someone, the other guy walks away. That’s the difference between us,” he spoke.
Then he moved.
He reaches back into the bag, never breaking eye contact, and he retrieves something. The item is wrapped around one fist, then the other, and pulled taught. The wolf’s eyes focus. It’s a bike chain. Cold, dark metal fashioned into impromptu brass knuckles. He took one step forward. Then another. And he kept going, at a steady pace.
“I don’t like to leave witnesses.”
It’s a ridiculous statement, coming from a young child. But with the shadows growing around him, and the weapon in his hands. Not to mention his voice. The conviction, the menace, the rage.
A sudden thought ran through the mugger’s mind. I’m going to die here. She tries to shake it off, but the fear grips her heart like a vice. Xerxes keeps walking forward. She fumbled for anything she could do to turn the tides in her favor.
“I have an epithet!”
It’s a bald-faced lie. But, in the heat of the moment, it’s usually enough to throw someone off their rhythm. Epithets are wild cards, you can never predict what they can do. But the child doesn’t care. He just keeps walking. Actually, he grips the chain tighter.
“We both know that’s a lie. I can see it in your eyes.” Two more steps. “You’re terrified.”
“Stay back! Do you really wanna mess with an inscribed?”
Xerxes pauses, and the mugger thinks her bluff has borne fruit. Then he looks up at her. Directly into her eyes, for the first time. If he was scary before, this is horrifying. It’s as if pure fear radiates from him and into the mugger. The wolf can’t help the small whimper that escapes her. It’s quiet, but he hears. He smiles, then talks, “What makes you think this isn’t my epithet?” His match towards her begins again. Each footstep echoes in her mind like warning bells.
“So…” He grins. “What do you think? Do you think you can defeat me with your imaginary epithet? Are you willing to make that bet?”
The wolf cowards. What are you supposed to do here? What kind of hail mary could save her now? The girls! She picked up the blonde one and held her at knifepoint.
“Stop! Don’t you care what happens to these two!”
He never falters.
“Like I said.” He stretches this pause out. “I don’t like to leave witnesses.”
It didn’t take a second for her to decide what to do. She runs out of the alley faster than she’s ever run before. The three children wait with bated breath as her footsteps disappear. Once she’s gone for good, the girls look up at the monster that saved them. There’s a clattering noise as the chain is dropped.
Xerxes Roughhouse did not have an epithet.
Xerxes Roughhouse has never been in a real fight in his entire life.
Xerxes Roughhouse is starting to hyperventilate.
“Oh my god,” he sputtered. “Oh my god. I just threatened to kill someone. I just threatened to kill you guys!” The monster from before is gone. In its place is a young scared child, one that just wants his friends to be safe. “I’m so sorry, I panicked, it was all I could think of.”
Xerxes hadn’t lied to the mugger. Well, he did bluff, but he was telling the truth about his family. He is the youngest Roughhouse, and he learned a lot from them. He has 5 lifetimes of street smarts drilled into his raspberry head.
“It’s fine Xerce, you saved us!” Charles cried out, flinging herself around Xerxes in a hug. Zora joined the hug, and the three sat there, holding each other. The kids at school nicknamed them the “Sherbert Trio” because their signature colors match the colors of sherbert. Green, pink, and orange.
Zora, Xerxes, and Charles.
Xerxes Roughhouse and Charles Foxtrot.
Zora’s best friends.