The Prince of Astoria-Chapter 76: LXXVI - Worlds Away

Two hours later...

"You’re taking the bus? And you’re going out like that?" Gabe nagged.

Etienne stared into the full-body mirror in the foyer and adjusted himself. He zipped his black quarter-zip sweater up to the top and moved the black medical face mask to cover his nose fully.

Etienne rolled his eyes, "I know I just told you to look out for my best interests, but do you really have to nag me about every single thing? I don’t what to go out like this, but my last double panel hoodie got burnt to a crisp in my fight with Senshi Sentinel."

Etienne pinched his forehead, "I really lost a lot during that fight. Anyway, I need something way more durable going forward. But more important than that, I need a weapon. And I’m going to try to source both myself."

Gabe nodded his head slowly, "I understand that much, but why are you taking the bus. If you don’t feel like driving, I’ll take you..."

Etienne knelt down and laced his boots, "It’s not that Gabe. I enjoy taking public transport when I’m not in a rush. It makes me feel like I’m closer to the city. When I take one of the sports cars, it feels like I’m worlds away from the people that are supposed to be our neighbors."

He reached for the front door handle but stopped himself just before grabbing it. He looked back at Gabe and smiled, a weak smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes, "I’ll be back later."

Etienne put his hands in his pockets and walked down the hill the mansion sat on.

"It’s not a terrible question," Etienne thought to himself, "Why am I taking the bus? I have access to a few luxury sports cars, and I’m sure Gabe spent hours cleaning and detailing them. I could just sit back and live in the lap of luxury."

Etienne kicked a rock as he descended the hill into town.

"The problem is, I haven’t earned any of it. If I did that, if I just enjoyed the fruits of my parents’ labor, how would I be any different from my extended family?"

Etienne stopped walking and tapped his chin, "Well, there are a few ways, but...no. Even if I didn’t kill for it like they did, even if I was always set to inherit it, I still need to build a legacy of my own."

Etienne made his way to the bus terminal in the middle of Astoria. He pulled a crumpled sticky note out of his pocket and read the messy handwriting.

Meticula

11 NE Bridgeford Blvd, Bend, OR 977XX

Emil Jacquet Droz

"A fellow Frenchman," Etienne thought to himself, "No call-ins, no online orders...you only get the ’privilege’ of having a weapon made after an in-person interview."

He stuffed the sticky note back into his pocket and looked around for a sign labelled ’Bend’.

He found it after a short while and leaned against the sign, closing his eyes.

He exhaled loudly, his breath visible in the cool fall air.

"I wish I could keep a phone with me. Maybe I could, maybe I’m being too paranoid..."

After half an hour, a humongous double-decker bus rolled to a stop in front of the sign. Etienne boarded the bus and walked up to the second level, quickly making his way to the back.

He passed a dozen rowdy teenagers, hollering, laughing and arguing, and he sat behind them.

"Yo, did you guys see that Yorrk the Machinist livestream yesterday?" A lazy boy lounging in his seat asked, "The meet and greet at the mall?"

"Is that what that was supposed to be? A meet and greet?" Etienne thought to himself.

One of the loud boys with fiery red hair scoffed, "Pfft. Really? You watch that wannabe mad scientist? I can’t stand more than a few minutes of that melodramatic crap. Did anybody see that clip where he was talking about the struggles of talking to computers or whatever?"

"That’s his most popular clip, idiot. You and seventy million people have seen it," Another boy piped up.

The boy with red hair bucked at him, then turned back to the lazy boy, "Whatever. It’s all crap. I’ll just stick to listening to Jonah Matthews."

The lazy boy stood up, his voice becoming more passionate, "Are you serious? Melodramatic? Bro, you can’t just watch clips and make a judgement! You have to watch the full stream to get the full experience! He’s not talking that fake masculine, pull yourself up by your bootstraps nonsense like Jonah Matthews! He’s talking about real human stuff. Depression, loneliness, isolation—"

The boy with red hair failed to hold back a laugh, "The rest of us can’t relate to that, Pat. And we definitely don’t want to listen to someone talk about that for hours on end."

All the boys in the back of the bus erupted into uproarious laughter. Pat shrunk back in his seat and crossed his arms.

An older boy with dark stubble and deep bags under his eyes stood up in his seat and leaned against the window.

"Regardless of how you feel about him, we should all be watching him and his group."

There were various confused murmurs among the boys before the older boy put his hand up and quieted them down.

"Just listen," He commanded with a booming deep voice, "This guy is the hottest thing in streaming right now. 90k followers in 2 weeks. The other members of his group are almost as popular. And they’re all based out of Oregon. When was the last time we had a bonafide celebrity out of Oregon?"

Etienne scratched his chin and thought, "The kid does have a good point. My parents are the last ones I can think of, but that’s over ten years ago at this point."

"Yeah, that is true," One boy called out.

"I guess he’s right..." Said another boy.

The boy with red hair shouted out, "The only reason I’d turn on one of that group’s boring streams is to see where they’ll be next. I know you all saw what they did to that mall, right? If that’s what their meet and greets look like, I’d love to be their fan."

"It wasn’t supposed to go like that. It was supposed to be a normal meet and greet. Yorrk said so himself," Pat muttered pensively.

The boy with red hair smacked his teeth, "They ended up causing 30k in property damage and they stole over 120k worth of goods. Some meet and greet that was."

Another boy piped up, "You want to cause chaos, Dany? You’re worried about the wrong thing! I wanna meet the rest of the Dark Pattern. Have you seen Bomb Proof? She’s so cool!"

The crowd grew louder and louder as the boys had overlapping conversations.

"Bomb Proof? She’s not even a metahuman! You just want to meet her because she’s hot! The Terminator is way better. I want to see if the knight armor he wears is real or just a costume."

The boys began to wrestle and throw items across the bus, and their volume reached a fever pitch.

Etienne crossed his arms and leaned back in his seat. He thought to himself, "You can learn a lot by sitting back and listening. It seems like this ’Dark Pattern’ group is more of a net negative than I thought at first. Robbing and looting is one thing; there’s only so much I can do about crimes happening hundreds of miles away. But influencing kids to do the same, right in front of me...that’s a whole different problem."

Etienne squeezed his fist and looked down, "Even without a weapon, it wouldn’t take much for me to to knock some sense into these kids and tell them not to idolize those streamers. But they haven’t done anything wrong really, hurting them seems extreme. Luckily, ninjas have other ways to attack besides physically."

He made a hand sign with hands and heat emanated off of his body.

"Hidden Ninja Art: Fearmonger!"

The hollering and yelping ceased immediately, and most of the boys froze immediately. A few of them hugged themselves, and others shook their heads and muttered to themselves.

Pat, the older boy and the boy with red hair looked around at their friends in confusion.

"Jay, what’s going on with them?" The boy with red hair asked the older boy.

Jay shrugged and looked around at them, "I’m not sure. Seems a little convenient though, right? I mean, as soon as we talk about the Dark Pattern, everybody starts getting the chills. It’s almost like..."

Jay glanced out of the bus’ window before fixing his eyes onto Etienne, just for a second.

"It’s almost like someone is trying to silence us."

Etienne stared back at Jay, and watched as the boy’s eyes flashed red. Jay looked away from him, and turned the to the boy with fiery hair.

"Landon, you’re coming with me and Pat to the next Dark Pattern event," Jay barked out.

Landon ran his hand through his spiky red hair and groaned, "Fine."