As Crescent stepped into #2011, the rancid air penetrated her lungs with a force she wasn't expecting. She underestimated how bad this place is. After a violent cough, she held her breath until she exited the bathroom.

  Entering from the convenience store was a good move. They're stacked with gas masks and they're cheap. She gets four, paying at the counter using the company card for the last time ever. After putting the mask on she stepped out into the decently kept yet still filthy streets. It was clear that the very few residents of the dimension do their best to keep the streets somewhat tidy… to the best of their ability at least.

  "Where was this place again? Ugh… I'm shit with directions." Crescent mumbled to herself, trying to recall the route Raiden took her on when she first went to their base.

  As she turned the corner into an alley, she came across a door. Looked familiar enough. Worst case scenario, it's not the place and she leaves… okay well worst case scenario, she dies, but let's not be negative for once.

  She opens the door and steps in quietly, looking around. This definitely wasn't the place. Like nowhere near it. It was filthy. Like even for this dimension's standards it was disgusting. But those kids are pretty popular so there's a chance someone here could give directions.

  As she's about to move further, she feels a breath against her neck, and fingers running through her hair.

  "Aren't you pretty~ This place is pretty small, and I've never seen you around. I'd remember such a pretty face. What's your name Darling?" He said, his voice scratchy and playful. He sounded old but looked fairly young. 24, maybe 26 at the most. He absolutely reeked of smoke. A nauseating mix of weed and cigarettes. That being said, he didn't seem high. His eyes were normal, he was standing normally, his words were articulated well, he was just… creepy.

  "My name isn't important, I'm not here for long. I'm looking for Ash and Raiden, You know 'em?" Crescent asked, her voice cold as she took a large step away from him, earning a chuckle.

  "Ouch~ Rejected." He feigned a frown, dramatically. He glides toward her again, in front of her this time, The silver jewelry strewn across his face glinting in the dim light. Two on his lower lip, one on his eyebrow, a septum, a crap ton on his ears… some look infected. Ew. aannd, one on his tongue. That last one took awhile to notice. What didn't take long to notice was that black Clown make up and poorly bleached liberty spikes. To each their own, I guess.

  "Freckle face and glasses girl, right? I can lead you to 'em, doll~" He smirked, taking her hand and giving a slight bow. He had 6 prosthetic fingers, On the hand he used to take hers the middle, index and thumb were robotic and on the other his pinky, ring and index fingers were robotic.

  "I try to make a habit of not following strangers in alleyways." Crescent responded, not yet pulling her hand back but keeping her guard up.

  "Ah. How rude of me, my friends all call me Jester~ I like to help out all the lost little mice that drop by somehow. Most of em die out here though, flesh can't take the rain. Annyyyways. Now that we aren't strangers, why don't you come with me?" He grins. Crescent pulls her hand away, tilting her head and crossing her arms.

  "Just because I know your name doesn't mean we're suddenly acquainted. You could be a total psycho for all I know." She retorts, holding his gaze as he cackles. Was it really that funny? No. He doesn't seem to have all his screws in. And the ones that are in aren't screwed very tight.

  "Anyone you know could be a psycho… You yourself could be one. If you ask me, Psychos are the most interesting people, so I'm hoping you are one." He says, his grin widening in excitement.

  "That makes me even less willing to follow you." Crescent responded, sighing. Jester chuckled again.

  "You're so honest… I like you." He says, getting close again.

  "No, I'm just blunt. I lie a lot." Crescent replied, stepping back again. Jester's grin widens.

  "Just there, you were honest again!" He says, earning a tired eyeroll.

  "I have places to be, "Jester" If you aren't gonna help, I'm just gonna go on my own." She said, exasperated. Jester pouted childishly at that. Gliding in front of her.

  "Come onnnn~ let me lead the way. If it's scary, you can just hold me at gunpoint the whole time!" He says, eyes sparkling.

  "I don't have a gun so-" Jester pulled out a gun. Excited. He basically pushed it into Crescent's hands. She blinks, taken aback by the sudden placement of a firearm in her hand. She opens the chamber and, lo and behold, it's full. A strange man just handed her a loaded gun and told her to aim it at him while he led the way.

  This was a bad idea. An awful, terrible idea. Ugh, where's Dusk when you need him? He's so unserious he would've made agreeing to this much easier... Mostly because that way, she could pin any bad results on him. But this now is all her.

  "I-... ugh.. I can't believe I'm doing this…" She sighed. Aiming the gun at his chest and jerking her head, signalling him to walk. He wasn't much of a threat... Usually. Buuut she isn't in her mission suit right now, considering how suddenly this one came about. She doesn't have her water bottle so she's kinda handicapped right now.

  "I'm 26!" Jester suddenly yelled, jolting Crescent out of her own thoughts. She raised a brow, trying to figure out where the fun fact even came from.

  "Come onnnn. It's quiet and boringggg. Talk to me!" He whined. Loud and petulant… And annoying. Really annoying.

  "...19." She mumbled, begrudgingly. He smiled. Jumping in excitement.

  "Woah… You're little! Thank God you rejected me, ha! Can I know your name now?"

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  "I'm not– ugh… It's Crescent."

  "Crescent... Little moon! Adorable!"

  "You're pissing me off, I'm not a child so–"

  A loud, enraged voice cut through their idle chatter. They looked ahead to see a group of roughly 13 people, wielding bats and pipes, clearly seething.

  "Jester, you little shit! You jacked my gun!"

  The one in front yelled, his face red with rage, the pipe in his hand shaking. Jester stood there, grinning like he felt no guilt– which he didn't– If anything, he found the whole situation hilarious.

  "Ahhh, D man! Good pal, how you doing?" He said, waving obnoxiously. His tone made the one in front scoff in disbelief, his eye twitching. Crescent lowered the gun, hiding it behind her back with a look of pure disbelief on her face. She took a step back, then another, then she grabbed Jester's wrist and booked it as he laughed psychotically.

  "Where's the nearest and biggest body of water?" She asked, dragging him as she sprinted away from the angry mob chasing them.

  "Uhhhh… probably the lake. It's mostly filled with acid though." He says, acting like they aren't essentially running for their lives.

  "Acid. ugh... This better work. Where is it?" She says, not at all hopeful. She listens to Jester's directions and arrives at the lake. It was fairly big, slightly greenish and bubbling.

  Crescent let go of Jester's wrist, getting closer to the water. She breaths, places one foot forward, bends her knees slightly and puts her hands out. Closing her eyes. Focused.

  Focus.

  She can hear the footsteps of the mob approaching, she can hear her own heartbeat. She can hear the acid water. She focuses on it. Shuts everything else out.

  Focus.

  The water in the lake moves. Spiraling. The water follows her hands as she manipulates it, raising a fair amount and shooting it at them.

  Their screams were blood curdling. Loud out pained as the highly acidic water burned their flesh. It looked like they were melting, welts appearing, blood starting to pour out. It was horrific. Jester, ever the weirdo, was laughing his ass off. He clapped like he just finished watching a broadway show as the mob ran off, dispersing in different directions. Some dropped in agony. Some may have died– let's not think about that though.

  Jester and Crescent ran the other way, stopping in another alleyway. As they catch their breath, Crescent glared at him.

  "A stolen gun? Wanna explain that?" Jester blepped, putting his arms up as if surrendering.

  "Stolen is such a harsh word~ I just… borrowed it from Dimitri, indefinitely." He said, feigning innocence. Crescent was unamused. She rolled her eyes and started walking again, not caring whether he followed or not. If anything, she hoped he wouldn't, but he did. Enthusiastically.

  "It's almost night time. We should sleep, Little moon. The weather gets gnarly at night." Jester says, skipping behind her. To say Crescent was exasperated would be a massive understatement. She stops walking and looks at him over her shoulder.

  "Where do you suggest we go then?" She asks, fighting no urges and glaringing at him. He smiles, grabs her arm and starts skipping again. She stumbled at first before walking quickly to keep up.

  "You damn weirdo, slow down!" She yelled. He ignored her, skipping on until they reached some kind of warehouse building. It was kind of deteriorated and had poison ivy all over the walls but eh. It had a roof and some doors so it was good enough.

  He lead her up to the fourth floor to a small set up he had. A mattress dead in the middle of the room, touching no walls. I mini fridge in the corner, a suspicious hole in the wall, dust bunnies everywhere.

  "...Why is the mattress there..?" Crescent asked, a look of unadulterated judgment painting her face. She side eyed him, her brows furrowed, blinking in confusion.

  "It's practical. I even measured it, now no matter where I am, I'm the same distance away from my bed!" He replied, looking way too proud of himself for something so hard to look at.

  Crescent said nothing. She blinked once, pursed her lips, gave a resigned nod and walked around, trying to find at least one normal thing. While looking around, she saw a picture. A young infant with straigh growing platnium blonde hair, held by a mini Jester, smiling.

  "Who's this?" She asked, turning to Jester with the picture in hand. Jester pauses, his frown faltering for just a moment before returning to normal.

  "Ah, that's Wraith, my little brother. He vanished when he was a baby and I haven't seen him since. Imma find him soon, got years of big brothering to do, what if he can't name any rock songs? Can't let that happen to my blood." Jester said. Joking. He turned to Crescent, Smiling.

  "He's your age, Y'know! Want me to play cupid for ya?" He beamed, Tapiing her arm with his elbow and wiggling his eyebrows. Crescent rolled her eyes, crossing her arms with a scowl.

  "I'll pass." She said, stepping away from him. Jster gives her the bed for the night, sleeping on the window sill across the room. The wind howled restlessly throughout the night, Thunder and lightning followeing in its wake.

  As per usual it let up in the morning, leaving the streets in disarray, but anyone who lives there is used to that my now. They got up pretty early– well… Crescent got up early and forced Jester to take her where she needs to be.

  Jester lead her through the streets, skipping all happy go lucky in a way that pissed Crescent off. They arrived at a metal door with a bull spray painted on it. Jester knocks a weird jingle on the door and waits a bit before the door opens.

  "Jester, I swear on everything I hold dear, If you lost another finger, I will–" Raided said, her brown eyes narrowing and black wolf cut swaying in the wind as jester puts his hands up in surrender.

  "Pump the breaks kid~ just dropping off a guest." He says, smirking wide. Raiden looks behind him and sees Crescent, Her sclown shifting to a smile.

  "You came back!" She smiled, running to give her a hug. Crescent stumbled a bit at the contact, patting Raiden on the back. Raiden pulls away excitedly, dragging her inside as Jester bids his farewell.

  "Ash! Crescent is back!" She yelled. A tall, freckled, lanky boy looked over his shoulder, away from the large monitor on his side of the office, part of his braces and snake bites glinting as the light of the screen shone against a portion of his pale skin.

  "Is she broken?" He asked, casual. Not necessarily cold or mean, just rathe blunt.

  "Ouch, I'm not that fragile." Crescent mused, Walking over and sitting on the makeshift hospital bed they had set up.

  "In a bit of a predicament. We need a favor… How's the mirror mission going?" She asked, almost casually but still keeping a little seriousness in her tone.

  "How do you know we're looking for a mirror?" Raiden asked, knew voice rising in pitch by a fraction. Crescent chuckles, laying back.

  "Solar told us. We're working together with two other friends, problem is, we got some trackers in us that need to get extracted." She replied. The two kids pause for a bit, surprised.

  "Huh, the two who survived this hellscape are teammates now. Who woulda' thunk." Ash spoke, after the brief silence.

  "We couldn't find one, buuut~ based on the description solar gave us, we're working on making one. We have the frame we just don't know how to make the reflective part right." She mentioned, leading her to the tall frame she had created for the mirror.

  "Glass, thin layer of liquid tin, thin layer of liquid silver, some reducing agent thingy. We were told this when we entered the Company but I didn't pay full attention. I know those are the materials though." Crescent stated, inspecting the frame as Raiden smiled. The materials needed were really easy to find in this dimension. Who would've thought there'd be actual useful things here.

  As raiden began getting what was needed and crafting the mirror, Crescent went back to the hospital bed and took a nap. She has no clue how long she was out but when ashton woke her up, it was done. A giant mirror in the center of one of their rooms.

  "Jeez, that was fast." She remarked, looking closely at the craftsmanship. It was weirdly good quality. She finally stood up and headed toward it. The familiar electric blue light appearing as she approached.

  "Alright... yawn. Time for everyone else to join."