"And… Go!"
Ezra dove behind nearby bushes, hiding in the shrubbery while Marco started walking up to the rookie Hunters.
The feelings of pointy twigs rubbing against his thin, pale skin irritated the boy, yet the cover of shadows offered a much-needed protection against the blistering sunlight.
Slowly, he crawled through the underbrush, positioning himself behind the group of youngsters—their targets—with his hands ready to snatch.
Listening in on their carefree conversation, he waited for Marco to approach them and give him the signal to steal.
"How do you guys do it…"
Marco ran up to the cadets, his face drenched in sweat and his breath ragged from the extreme heat.
It was a setup, of course, the so-called 'sweat' was really just water, and the ragged breathing was just an exaggerated result of a light jog.
The eight rookies looked at each other, confused, before laughing lightly as one of them turned to Marco, driven by curiosity.
"Do what?"
Marco's face lit up in admiration, a sly smile coming into Ezra's view.
"Sit out in this awful weather, of course! I've been watching you guys out here for hours, and you haven't even taken a single sip of your water! I just found myself wondering how you awesome Hunters do it!"
Wiping his forehead with one hand, he watched as the rookies beamed with pride at the obvious flattery.
"Oh no… I'm sure you're plenty awesome too! We're just fine because…"
As they started talking pleasantly, Marco lightly tapped one of his feet against the pavement, a subtle yet deliberate motion—that was all the black-haired boy needed to put their plan into effect.
Sneaking forward, he reached towards their belts one at a time, quietly unclipping the latches that held the cords to which their badges were attached.
His hands moved deftly, reenacting the movements that Marco had drilled into him beforehand.
The practice might have been brief, but the boy's aptitude for pickpocketing was unmistakable.
Even if the Hunters were advanced enough to have detection abilities, such mana-reliant skills would be useless against Ezra, whose body naturally resisted all mana, regardless of its form or purpose.
As he reached over to grab the last one, a strong hand suddenly descended from above and grabbed his own.
Ezra threw a panicked look up, only to find a black-haired man staring at him silently—the owner of the badge he was just about to snatch.
He was the oldest of the cadets, and he had a large black sword attached to his back, the blade radiating an unusual hue, which made Ezra's skin tingle.
Whether it was a coincidence or the effect of some strange ability, the man managed to sense the boy, yet, as he stared straight into his multi-colored eyes, he remained silent.
The rather old Hunter seemed to be the outcast of the group, standing a little further away from everyone else.
The black-haired man looked back at Marco, who continued to talk with the younger prospects, then turned back to the boy and handed him his badge, casually, as though it held no importance to him.
Without another word, he patted Ezra on the head while simultaneously standing up and walking away.
He didn't say anything during the interaction, leaving the small child stunned, his heart pounding from the terror of getting caught, and his mind in turmoil.
Standing there without any idea of what to do, he glanced over at Marco, who stared at him while mouthing a silent request.
Run now!
Understanding the words, he bolted, diving through the bushes and into the busy plaza, where he tore down the streets towards their predetermined meeting place.
Soon after, Marco escaped as well, if it could be called an escape at all—he simply walked away like a normal civilian would.
Five minutes later, they were back together, laughing, the eight badges in their hand glistening in the unrelenting sunlight.
"Let's take a look at the paintings on their IDs! I heard the Guild tries to ruin your portrait on purpose!"
He took the stolen cards from Ezra and started sorting through them, snickering at a few of the more unfortunate black-and-white images.
Making his way to the very last one, he stopped, furrowing his brow with confusion.
"Ez… You really took this from his waist, right?"
The black-haired boy tilted his head to the side, taking a glance at the portrait in Marco's hand, recognizing the man who had given him the paper on his own.
"N-n-no. H-h-h-he sensed me b-b-but he still gave it t-t-too me!"
Adding enthusiasm to the end, he watched his friend's face go pale, a tremor making its way up his body.
"E-ezra… W-what have you done…"
The child furrowed his brow, slowly looking up at him.
"W-w-w-w-what did I-I-I do…?"
Then the boy looked down at the floor, obviously not understanding the severity of what had happened.
"EZRA! WHAT THE HELL DID YOU DO!"
Marco's fist moved before he could even consider what he was doing and slammed into the boy's jaw, knocking him to the pavement.
"THAT MAN IS A MARSHAL EZRA! ARE YOU DOWNRIGHT STUPID? DO YOU KNOW WHAT WILL HAPPEN WHEN HE TELLS THEM THAT WE STOLE FROM A MARSHAL?"
He slammed his foot into Ezra's chest, knocking him into a small alleyway far away from prying eyes.
The black-haired boy didn't know what to do or think, his entire body in gut-wrenching pain and his eyes watering.
He tried to shout, but the voice didn't come out, the trauma he had experienced welling up in his mind once again.
The most he could manage was calling out to the young man in a trembling voice.
"M-m-m-m-m-m-marco… S-s-s-s-s-s-stop…"
His pleas were ignored as his supposed friend stomped his face into the ground, again and again, until the stone brick floor dripped with blood.
"IDIOT, IDIOT, IDIOT, IDIOT, IDIOT! WHY THE HELL DID I EVEN BUY YOU! NOW I'M GOING TO GET EXECUTED BY A MARSHAL FOR WHAT YOU'VE DONE!"
He froze, momentarily ceasing his assault as his eyes went wide with realization and fear.
"N-no… They'll find out about it… T-they can't… N-not about the experiment…"
Marco's entire body began to shake
The idea of his hard work going to waste left him crippled in fear.
"EZRA YOU IDIOT!"
Finally, with one strong kick, he hit the boy's skull, knocking him unconscious.
Breathing hard, the son of the butcher looked down at his own hands stained with blood, a fuzzy haze covering his mind.
Feeling the harsh rays of the sun burning on his skin, he then turned his gaze towards the sky, a shadow blocking his view of that blazing sphere.
Squinting, he noticed a hooded figure with a large black sword standing right at the entrance of the alleyway, a look of disgust covering his face.
Marco's pupils trembled with fear, his mouth opening to beg, pleas coming out of him in a harsh stutter.
However, he was dead before he spoke.
Jumping down from the loft, the swordsman placed the tip of his sword on Ezra's head, and a wave of pitch-black radiance rippled through the boy's body.
Then, without another word, he vanished into the darkness, never to be seen in that city until the Lispentine Tournament nearly eight years later.
…
"Lift him into here!"
Ezra awoke to the sound of machinery around him, a loud furnace blasting fiery heat somewhere close, leaving him to itch and claw at his own skin.
Slowly, as his eyes cleared, he noticed two figures looming over him, their faces covered in masks.
He tried to speak, but after a few failed attempts, he realized that he was completely mute, his voice erased like magic.
Yet, this was no spell—as the memories of what had happened before he had been knocked out appeared back in his mind, he understood.
A sudden thought occurred to him in that moment as he lay in that strange white room, the bright lights above him flashing like the sun.
I-I killed Marco… I-I shouldn't have taken that man's badge… It's my fault Marco beat me…
Thinking of his kind friend, the one who had laughed and shared popcorn with him, he could not accept the reality of what had happened, his own mind playing a trick on him in order to deny the truth.
As he looked around, he realized that he was in some sort of hospital, with various tubes hooked up to his arms.
Blood pulsed through the pumps, the metallic creaks ringing through his ears like drums hammering across a stage.
Looking at the two men, he couldn't see Marco, a knot of worry growing in his chest as he opened his mouth, forcing his uncooperative vocal cords to work as he wanted in hopes of finding his friend.
"W-w-w-wheres M-m-m-m-m-marco…?"
Both of the hooded figures looked over at him, their guns instantly trained on the freshly awakened boy.
One of the men whispered to the other a sentence that Ezra couldn't quite understand.
"Do you want to tell him his buddy has died, or should I?"
While he understood the basics of Nordic, the verbs came hard to him, and thus, he did not understand the word that meant 'died'.
"Y-y-y-you know M-m-m-m-marco?"
The two men exchanged glances before stopping the pump that sucked his blood without hesitation.
"Your friend is dead."
The closer of the two, a man—from what Ezra could tell—one with a long gray beard and deep gray eyes, spoke first.
Once again, he could not decipher the part that talked of death.
"W-w-w-w-w-where is h-h-he? H-h-he told me to find him!"
Raising his voice, distressed, he noticed the first man pressing the root of his nose, while the second shook his head.
"Buddy, your friend ain't coming back. When we found him, he was in two pieces. You get it? Two… Pieces…"
The man made a few motions with his hands as if trying to reenact the scene, and a look of confusion crossed over the black-haired boy's face for a moment before he shook his head.
"M-marco is my friend! H-he isn't a sandwich!"
The two kidnappers—who were definitely not trying to explain to him how to make a sandwich—sighed, and one of them looked at the nearly liter of collected blood, rubbing his neck.
"He's a lost cause…"
The gray-bearded man picked up one of the sacks attached to the pumps and inspected the crimson content before turning back to the boy.
"Yeah, bud… You stay here with us, and Marco will come find you."
Excitement instantly emerged over the boy's face, a smile coming quickly and easily.
"T-t-thank you f-for t-telling me!"
Trying to stand up, he was stopped by the second of the two men, who he could now see had a brown beard and green eyes.
"Whoa there, kid… Uh… Marco will only come and pick you up if you help us first!"
There was a brief pause as Ezra processed the information, his eyes darting around the room before returning to the man who had blocked him.
"O-okay! W-w-w-what h-h-help you need?"
Both of the kidnappers exchanged a smile with one another before speaking in unison, a dark shadow covering the black-haired boy's face as they spoke.
"We're just going to need to run some tests on your special blood!"