Jaeger: Chapter 5

Chapter 5: The fog stays, but spreads

Solomon, Jack, and Malcom made their way up through the hatch and through a series of preprepared routes of escape thanks to Malcom and quickly made it street side of the ground level of the city.

"Ahh…" Solomon and Jack took in a deep breath of air, one they hadn't tasted in such a long time. It wasn't intoxicating, but more nostalgic. Of course they had circulation systems to the spaces below, no patron wanted to watch a fight in stuffy air. For them though, this was the first step to true freedom and the air itself was also symbolic of fresh beginnings albeit under strange circumstances.

Malcom waved them down the street, which caused Jack and Solomon to look at each other with a strange view. As they walked over Malcom began walking directly into the middle of the street looking around back and forth and around corners.

"Where the fuck..." He said after a while with a confused expression on his face, not unlike disbelief but more contemplative in its contortions.

"What is it?" Solomon asked as he joined him in gazing around.

"This…around this building is quite a bit of fanfare of merchants, sellers, entertainment for the ground section…there isn't a soul around though haven't you noticed already?" Malcom had an almost horrified look to his face as he slowly contemplated that the fog hadn't started below, but in fact from above.

Jack stepped forward, looking at traces of footsteps upon the wet concrete under over hangs where the rain couldn't touch the ground. It was as if people disappeared during a full spring jog or walk. The steps were there, and then miraculously disappeared halfway through a step.

Solomon saw the prints and bent down to touch them as well, "We can confirm that either the people evaporate into the fog…or are being transported somewhere by it. It must've come through the building... and then seeped down into the arena below…strange." Solomon stood and looked over at a nearby window displaying smokes and then grinned at Jack when a mischievous thought came to mind.

Malcom was turned around looking in the opposite direction when he heard a glass window shatter and abruptly whipped his head around only to see Jack and Solomon looking up at him with guilty eyes and cheeky grins.

They acted as if them breaking the window and stealing a carton of smokes wasn't even them before asking "Got a light?"

"You are damn right I got a light! I will set your ass on fire with it!" Malcom chucked a lighter as hard as he could at the two, but Jack nimbly caught it with such suave it made the throw look like it was under handed and not intended to smash him in the face.

Malcom muttered 'Bastards…' silently as he without hesitation walked into the store and looked around before stealing the cash out of the cash register like it was an innocent act in and of itself in comparison to theirs.

"What? Don't look at me like that, how can I pay them back without giving them money?" He asked as if it was they that were idiots. They laughed, "Says the guy full of fucking gem and coin…pay them back with money you robbed? Ahaha"

Truly though, there wasn't a soul around.

Finally after a while of travel they reached populace but it was as if everyone in the north section had disappeared or rather where they had just come from.

"Strange…where could they have gone…" Jack motioned them forward to seem inconspicuous even if they couldn't hide the contemplative looks on each of their faces.

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Jaeger was at a street corner with a mountain of a building behind him. Leaning against the wall of that building he peered out to a desolate street where not a single soul walked by.

"Doesn't make any sense…if the fog is abducting people, why then…is there no specific desire. Everybody…not the strongest, the weakest, people of certain class or order…any and all people."

'This would only mean that the fog has no real pertinence to design but merely its function. It can't be magical because it leaves no magical signatures or wakes…this could only mean that in the end the goal of the fog was to transport, but no person was spotted within several miles of the city…meaning even more it couldn't be magic because no single person could teleport people such vast distances, and most importantly for what purpose would they?'

Jaeger had obviously heard of groups that experimented on those with abilities but for that to work they would scout for those that actually HAD them. Not just any and all souls to test their luck, so to abduct people of this specific city in such a way without conferring the use of who they were abducting, it further made less sense.

"Hmm…" Jaeger was still pondering several questions when 3 men stumbled out of an alley into the street, they looked at the crowd walking by with confused expressions plastered on their faces. However for Jaeger he was the one confused at their arrival.

'Did they escape it somehow? They must be from the Arena I keep hearing about with all those scars…however the fog seeped directly into the vicinity of the said black market building so how did they escape it?' He had in fact been to such a building, information was constantly sought and sold there. Even if he hadn't met these people, he could confer from their stances they were fighters by nature.

Jaeger waited, watching them as they non-chalantly walked into the filled street and looked right and left. When they made their move off in a random direction, Jaeger popped his collar and followed after them discreetly.

They would have to have divine senses or an eye in the back of their head to find him. It had been a part of his main skills to tail people so this was no problem at all.

The three walked several miles before stopping in front of an inconspicuous café before heading inside. Jaeger watched through the window the men exchange some money to the café keeper before entering a backroom much to the alikeness of what Jaeger did with a certain café. Although the rain peppered his vision, he was far too used to it to be misled by a rinsed window to see what they were paying for.

Jaeger walked around the building to the back alley. There, he found a door leading through a conjoining shop. This was an old shop that had long been left to wither so he picked the lock and headed inside. A dust covered door connected this room with the Café's back end, meaning the two were truly connected as he had guessed. Jaeger was about to head through it and scope out the back of the café when he saw within the dust covered floor several foot prints, and to be exact the sets of 3 men.

Following the prints they led to an inconspicuous over turned table. Jaeger waited 5 minutes, eyeing his watch meticulously before silently lifting the table to find a hatch leading into the ground, he did this because he needed to give them time to move.

"Sewer systems…hmm…always that damned sewer…guess I was going there anyway before I heard about people disappearing." Jaeger pulled out a shabby folding knife from his pocket, and then slotted the hatch with it before lifting it quietly.

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Below was darkness, but just faintly a flicker of light could be seen casting shadows across grimy ground littered with dirt and decay. The ladder was a bit slippery from underground moisture and dust mixing but a slow tread and silent step easily got him down the ladder. Turning around the flicker of light had become more apparent and walking forward revealed it to be a lightbulb that went in and out as if it was teetering on its power.

"Strange…prone to technology rather than magic?"

The world of course had these types of things, as detailed designs sparked up just as fast as magical designs. Electrical routes were no different than magical theorem and runes and so they had been seen as one and the same. However, if one was smart enough they could surpass those with magic and even suppress them but the current era of technology amongst societies at least to Jaeger wasn't at that point.

Magical cities flourished over craft and magical creation, whereas cities without adapted by the use of what mages called 'Mortal technology' with bulbs like this being in that genre. Some scoffed at this notion, because a car was a car, it was reliable.

Hell, the regular bullets he had in his jacket pocket proved that he too used things outside the bound of magic. A bullet when struck shot out of a casing, it was as simple as the pull of a trigger.

If you weren't a mage you found other forms of weapons if you didn't have a power either, nobody liked to be lacking.

Jaeger stepped silently along a stream passing to his left down about a foot off the cement he currently treaded on. It wasn't dirty on the cement at all compared to the walls, meaning people cleaned or used this path often enough to not leave traces of decay from time.

Jaeger stopped after a while and noticed the ground was dirty from here forwards, but there was no turn? There was merely a cleaning cut line of fresh looking cement, and cement with an inch of shit and grime.

'The wall…' Jaeger looked to his right and peered over the wall, several places had been touched as if a hand swiped at them. However, there were five of them.

"Damnit…5 by 5, that's quite a few combinations…fuck'

If he messed it up by locking one successfully but tapped the wrong one next it might alert them.

Jaeger was about to start to press his ear to the wall when he heard cogs move from the other side, subtly but enough to alert him to get the living hell out of the way.

He looked to the murky ground that hadn't been treaded on and back the way he came. It was one long path the way he came, so of course he turned to the left and crept close to the wall with an angled footing to not leave steps upon the ground.

Holding his breathe, Jaeger moved around the curve following the ground into the darkness without bulbs until he disappeared from the lights from afar.

"I AM TELLING you Zee, they fucking disappeared before my eyes! Yes, they didn't die…at least not until they disappeared, but it makes no sense why the fog doesn't discriminate…it doesn't go through doors that aren't open either…I don't know."

Zee, a thin but tall man in black garb nodded as he led the 4 people in total back towards the entrance down here.

Jaeger however, watched the wall close as well as the rocks that were the mechanism triggers.

*puurk*

Each began to click and protrude back out in a sequence. He waited quite a while until the voices of the men died out and then hit the sequence upon the false rocks. The wall silently creaked and groaned before sliding open. Jaeger took out a watch, wound it to 30 seconds and hooked it to his wrist.

A frog appeared from the air before it was whipped into the large chamber of the crude pistol on Jaegers waist, and then poised for any leftover people as it swayed back and forth.

Jaeger looked around the room, and picked up a loose rock and threw it down the end of the barrel into the Frogs open mouth.

The room itself wasn't too strange, quite a bit of papers were strewn across several tables. Most of it detailed magical devices, and in fact some things Jaeger had never heard about before. Through another room carved out from the rock was a system of doors that had name plates by them detailing what routes they led to in the city. Of course, these were sewer routes.

Through another room was a crafting room most likely for crafting magical things, as a lot of prototypes or parts were strewn about to illustrate what was made within. A furnace was still hot to the touch meaning that within the last day something was made within its metal body. 'Zee' was most likely the person who crafted, as not another soul was around throughout the rooms.

Jaeger was about to leave the room when he saw a display case box set upon a table with several others.

"Mmm…oooh…"

It was some new prototype for a pistol, a lot of the boxes had strange weapons within that weren't quite…normal.

The pistol itself had a schematic set beside it and detailed what it was capable of. There was a regular pistol frame, break top style. Which meant that instead of the chamber flicking to the right or left, the barrel along with the chamber for rounds flipped down and a little piece extended out to poke spent casings out. Webel, Shotfield, these were designs from way back. However not a lot of people enjoyed the look or function and so, as they were mortal weapons anyway, the knowledge of them were merely for historical purposes.

The grip had an almost Katana style wrapping that went up in layers, back and forth criss cross. It was very well done, and the cloth material itself was fire proof from some strange unknown beast. The metal as well was made from the metal of a found artifact that was Nye indestructible. The grip didn't curve downward like most revolver types and went away from the back end of the pistol at a 45 degree angle. The end of the grip curved back slightly more and from it was a loop that could fit a finger through it.

It was most likely for a rope to secure it to the person, or merely for style.

The coolest thing was a second barrel set atop the pistols barrel. It went down with the second barrel and chamber as well of course. However, instead of revolver rounds the entire barrel slid forward and you could load shot gun shells or rifle shells into it!

"Oh you sexy little fuck…oh my…" Jaeger caressed the box the more he read.

The pistol barrel even had a separate little box with it, within was a suppressor! Jaeger's mouth was open, he was going to save up A LOT of money to be able to get a new gun made let alone something like a suppressor which most people didn't even know about.

Because guns were useless! Unless you were without magic or a power and needed a gun to hunt, who the hell wanted something as weak as a gun? Jaeger used one not because it shot pistol rounds but because he used his frog in a modified chamber to shoot out projectiles. That's why most people saw him as no different as common folk, except his frog could turn rain to fog as well.

However through the use of a pistol jaeger had become fond of guns. He was highly proficient with them as well at this point. His frog could shoot projectiles at around 900 feet per second. Not much different than most mildly powered pistols.

This gun however could shoot pistol bullets at 1200 feet per second! Oof!

Jaeger delicately placed on the suppressor to the pistol barrel, this thing was useful as hell.

"He wouldn't mind right..." Jaeger for good measure emptied out his coin purse packed with gold that he was going to buy a gun with, then rethought it and grabbed back the gold before throwing the display case into the furnace.

Jaeger looked at his watched quickly, he had about a minute left before that man Zee might arrive back. He had set it for 30 seconds once he entered, and after not finding anyone gave it two minutes to time down from.

Jaeger looked back into the display cases strewn about and stacked, and looked at the papers poking out from them one by one.

"Sword…shield…hammer…axe…glaive…knife? Mmm…"

He moved the display boxes stacked on the one labeled Knife, and then took out the small display box before moving the other boxes back.

This knife was much like the pistol, woven handle with cloth, and with a ring at the bottom. However, set into the blade was a ring as well.

"Marshall Style?" Jaeger had one like it too, but it was much more crudely punched. This one was finely made. The blade was 2 inches wide, with the ring set just above and forward of the top of the handle. It was a straight Weehawk Tanto style blade and even had a serrated backside. It was quite interesting, and so thus another display box ignited and burned up in the furnace mere moments later.

"More?" Jaeger found a tiny little box about the size of his hands facing each other. Inside was a derringer style pistol, it was a long style of 7 inches and again had that same handle wrap except without the ring. Unlike most derringer that loaded small .22 round bullet or slightly larger, this puppy could hold .45! It was a derringer, but it was thick as fuck! It could also hold FMJ 6.5 rounds through changeable slotting, so it was as versatile as the other pistol.

"Fuck it! Why not a hand cannon" Jaeger opened it and pocketed it and the ammo that went with it. Everything else in the display cases sadly wasn't very befitting of his style, and so as his watch silently stopped functioning he left through the second room towards the door marked 'Downtown'.