1. What Just Happened?

To think this tale ended up starting as a budding fake M:TG set I was working on to vent ideas out of my head...heh. While I don't expect any pairings to come out of the woodwork, you all know how stories can sometimes go a different direction on both author and reader. Let us see how this tale reads out, shall we?

I don't own anything from the M:TG universe outside of _maybe_ my portrayal of varying characters. I only own three characters for certain, characters you all will soon see... This story is _technically_ a crossover story, but since the only crossover aspect is the origin behind certain characters, I didn't flag it as such.

* * *

**Crossing Paths**

**Chapter 1: What Just Happened?**

The streets around the Embassy were lively that day and the man dressed in blue knew he wasn't the reason for it this time. He walked through the crowd under the shroud of illusion, looking to be just another face in the crowd to anyone that saw him.

It made him glad to see at least a part of Ravnica like this, to see the men hugging their ladies, the children playing tag with one other before running to their mothers for treats and even the occasional pet scurrying across the dusty streets.

Speaking of children...

He pulled a few coins out of the coinpurse that hung from his belt, counted the amount that he pulled out before kneeling in front of one group of kids, dropping his illusion to only them.

"It bwu man," one of the younger children managed to say before five children of mixed genders, ages and species surrounded him. A grin forming on his own face at seeing them brighten up from his appearance, the man gave each of the children one of the coins he pulled out.

"Dank yu, blu man," another child cried before they ran off to their parents to tell them what happened, however he simply began to continue walking just before trying to point him out. He couldn't help but chuckle at the look of confusion when they saw that he had vanished from their view.

"Seriously, Jace, only two days and you're doing this?!"

And he couldn't help but stop in his place when he heard the name in that outcry, not recognizing the voice it came from. He blinked his blue eyes a few times in his confusion at the fact that he just heard his first name, which Jace was sure he didn't give to anyone that sounded like that.

"Can't catch me, Neos!" A young boy suddenly busted through the crowd near him at that point, the first thing of notice being his bright-yellow eyes as he carried a small box in his small arms. The kid had zipped past him before Jace could notice anything else other than the short brown hair and the white scarf around his neck.

It was the man chasing the kid that caused him to suddenly dive out of the way, however...

* * *

"Seriously, Jace, only two days and you're doing this?!"

A tall man in bright attire ran through the crowded streets, his head over most of the average-height humans in the area. Keeping a yellow-tinted hand over his wide-brimmed yellow hat to keep it from blowing off as he ran, the stranger kept chase after the child in white and brown attire, whom only looked back with a grin on his face and a mischievous glimmer in his yellow eyes.

"Can't catch me, Neos!" With this did the kid look forward again as he ran, which caused a mute growl to emerge from his own throat.

"Arceus-dammit, kid," the stranger, Neos, muttered under his breath as the kid he was chasing, Jace, ran past someone. His sense of smell alerted him to the faint smell of someone of higher standards being close by, and it became more noticeable when he almost bowled into someone that only moved at the last split-second. "Stay out of my way, idiot!"

Recovering from the delay in his dash, Neos scanned the surrounding area for whom he was chasing with his neon-green eyes, narrowing them as he realized he lost sight of his target. "Arceus-dammit, Jace," he almost roared before closing his eyes briefly then reopening them. Behind the neon-green irises and dark-green pupils glowed a light-blue light, though they did not cover his eyes.

Ravnica, to those with a particular kind of sight, is a colorful place to behold. The energy of the place was a literal rainbow of colors blending into one another, though there were still noticeable differences between who projected what colors. Not everyone was varying shades of the rainbow, however. There were those among the crowd that was a blend of two colors that managed not to overlap to create new colors, mostly blue and white energies or red and white energies that seemed to be sourced from people standing on guard in this particular area.

The man he past, however, was weird compared to everyone else. Unlike everyone else, correction every_thing_ else in this place, he had a solid yellow energy emerging from him with a blue light centered in his chest that spider-webbed through the rest of his body. While Neos wished he could find out why someone would emit that kind of energy, he knew he had someone to pursue and quick.

And his eyes fell upon a sliver of solid red running further in the distance. "Found you." His appearance began to shift rapidly between visible and not before disappearing a second later, reappearing in front of the young Jace, causing him to fall backwards onto his small rump. "I finally find a way out of that ass-backwards place for all three of us and you're already starting trouble for me here." The blue light had faded from his view, allowing Neos to glare down at the boy with narrowed eyes that barely held back a storm.

"But they're pretty," the young Jace whined before opening the box, revealing a set of five crystal shards within. Red, Green, Blue, White, Black.

"I don't care, I'm pretty sure there was a reason for their price tags, Jace Cort," Neos remarked, only barely keeping in his anger before grabbing the kid with a strong right arm. "Now, we're going back to the store, you're gonna return the gems, you're gonna apologize for taking them and you're going to do whatever else the man requests you do. Understood?"

The kid struggled for a bit before yielding, realizing he wasn't getting out of Neos' grip. "Fine..." Just like when Neos disappeared, both the kid and the man flickered rapidly between visible and not before disappearing a second later. Neither one of them had realized that the person the strange man almost bowled over had been watching them from a distance...


	2. Strange Creature

Going ahead and posting this up so people reading can have a little more substance to the story...

* * *

**Crossing Paths**

**Chapter 2: Strange Creature**

The elder Jace opened the door to the recently-finished Embassy building in the middle of the Tenth District, head leaned forward with the hood of his decorated cloak over it. While he was not to particularly disturbed by what transpired in the streets, though the sudden use of his first name did disarm him for a moment, it was what he felt when he decided to do a mental scan of the immediate area that set him on-edge.

The man in bright attire, whom the kid that shared his name had called Neos, felt hostile. It wasn't blocked off from him, no. It almost felt like a violent warning against trying to read his mind, like doing such would invite disaster. What could be hidden underneath such a veil?

Jace could hear someone talking nearby, but he barely heard it from being so lost in his thought.

"Jace Beleren! Are you somehow sleepwalking?!"

He heard that loud and clear, though.

"Lavinia," the mindmage sighed at the tone of voice he heard aimed at him, closing his eyes as he did. "I'm not sleepwalking, I'm not even asleep." Pulling back the hood from over his dark-blue, almost black hair, Jace gave the armored Azorius lady a sideways glance. "And I can't help that Rakdos minds are still too much to stomach at times."

The faint sound of metal clanging could be heard when the woman next to him, Lavinia, raised an open palm to her forehead. "It's been six month since you've become the Living Guildpact, and you're still getting shaken by things like that?"

"You're also not capable of seeing what they think," he immediately shot back before turning fully toward her, pointing back out toward the door as he did. "You think you've seen their worst stunts? There are things the Rakdos envision that even _they_ are afraid to perform, Councilor." A stunned look fell on her face as he took a few steps further into the building before hearing footprints behind him.

"Guildpact," he heard from behind him with a melodic echo, "we humbly request your aid with a strange disturbance." Unable to keep from raising an eyebrow at the request before turning around and regaining a straight face, he saw elven civilians dressed in the colors of green and white walk into the entrance room, Selesnya. They all wore a look that was a mix of worry and confusion, and the fact that there was no one representing a second guild coming up the steps started to leave him confused as well. This normally didn't happen.

"What is the problem?"

The trio, triplets most-likely, glanced toward each other before bringing their hands together, each forming a sphere of various colors before combining into one large orb. "There have been sightings among Selesnya territories regarding a strange creature stealing from us," they spoke as one, symbolic of the Conclave they represented. "Normally, we would take care of this ourselves, but we have reason to suspect that the Simic Combine has had a hand in these thefts."

The orb that had formed from three began to take on shape, molding into a shape that was both vaguely-familiar and not at all to the elven trio in front of him. It looked to him at first like a simple cream-colored fox before the tail, correction, _tails,_ began to form. It split into nine ends that became tipped with a bright orange. The irises of the eyes were a neon-green color, while the pupils were a dark-green instead of a normal black color. To him, it was possibly a nine-tailed kitsune, though he knew such didn't exist normally in this plane.

Yes, it looks weird for Ravnica, but it looked too...clean to be something created by the Simic however. They often didn't care about appearances, only functionality when trying to improve their biological creations. And so, with this thought in mind, he looked up toward the emerald-eyed trio. "Why do you think the Simic had a hand in this?"

"Our sentries saw it shapeshift into a large avian that we also have never seen before."

Jace couldn't help but gulp at the thought of dealing with a shapeshifter before looking back down toward the projected image. Past experiences certainly didn't help with the thoughts that threaten to creep into the back of his mind...

* * *

"Why did I decide to do this again," Jace muttered as he waited within a hollowed trees among the many within one of the parks made by the Selesnya Conclave, stiffling a yawn once more. He had been keeping an active mental scan of the area of the past thefts, since he could not yet see outside of the tree, though so far he had not picked up on anything. While the mindmage had no reason to disbelieve a guild whom is honest with each other about everything, the thought about a possible shapeshifter had him on edge, making him want to see this for himself.

As much as he hoped it wasn't the case, if the creature showed up and it turned up to be a shapeshifting Simic construct, he would have to have a good long talk with the Combine when he was done...

A rustling sound suddenly became heard beyond the bark of the tree about the same time he began to pick up on a new presence. He stood up from the center of the tree trunk before a sudden thought crossed his mind.

He felt this mind earlier today, the hostile energy that surrounded this new mind. Guarded not by a shield, but a blanket threat of harm to anyone that tried to pass the anger buffeting intrusion into the mind. The thought of the brightly-colored stranger from earlier came into his head at the thought, though he shook his head clear of it. Placing the tips of his fingers against the tree, he closed his eyes and focused a bit of blue magic into it, forcing it to open after summoning an illusion on the other side to hide the sudden opening.

A cream-colored fox came into view as it pawed its way into the park, carefully and quietly moving around as it did. Its nine tails swished around behind it, though no sound was made. Neon-green eyes appeared to scan the area, though there seemed to be a light-blue glow that seemed to appear through the green instead of over them like if Jace used his own magic. It turned its head toward where he was...

...and it looked dead at him for much longer than he was comfortable with. Could this creature see under illusions?

_"Show yourself, stranger,"_ an oddly-familiar voice suddenly became heard in his head after it closed then reopened its eyes to banish the blue light away, still looking toward him. Jace decided to slowly drop the illusion to not accidentally frighten the beast with his sudden appearance. _"You have a strange aura, dear."_

"Aura?" A confused look appeared on Jace's face at the voice before starting to look around for the source of the voice, believing it to be from a mind that was shielded from him. "You can come out of hiding instead of projecting your thoughts." The kitsune simply raised an eyebrow at his behavior.

_"I'm not hiding, I'm right in front of you."_ The human slowly turned his attention back toward the nine-tailed creature with stunned surprise.

_"You can talk with your mind?"_ To his surprise, the creature suddenly turned hostile, fangs bared and stance changed to better fit a sudden pounce that might spring from it at any moment.

"Nine..."

_"Stay out of my head, you damned psychic."_


	3. Greetings, Wanderer

Happy, happy, happy is me! I actually found me a Numenera (which is D&amp;D-like) group that'll let me play as a pre-Agents of Artifice variant of Jace! Yay! ^.^

* * *

**Crossing Paths**

**Chapter 3: Greetings, Wanderer**

_"Stay out of my head, you damned psychic."_

_Psychic? That's the first time I've ever been called that,_ Jace realized as he raised his hands in front of himself.

"Calm down, I'm not here to harm you-wait!" A light-blue glow surrounded the kitsune in a moment, its eyes never leaving the human as it became smaller and more blob-like, then larger and more and more like an bird. When the glow faded a few seconds later, a large bird that stood only a foot under the top of his head was left behind, most of its body covered with cream-colored feathers, though the wings and back were a darker-shade of brown. Upon its head was a full crown of enlonged yellow feathers that laid back behind it like hair.

"Pidge," it shrieked, causing Jace to cover his ears from the sharp sound.

_"Stay away!"_

Flapping its wings, it jumped into the air while his ears were still ringing from the shriek, taking the opportunity to become airborne. A growl left the mind mage's throat as he clapped his hands together, whispering undecipherable words as he tapped into the traces of blue mana around him from the water within the park. Careful not to destroy anything in the process, he slowly seperated his hands to see a miniature whirlwind began forming before pushing it forward toward the bird that was trying to fly off, allowing it to grow once he did. "Get back here!"

"Pidgeot!" It let off another shriek as it was caught within the violent yet contained whirlwind, spinning the bird within the core.

_"Arceus-dammit, how do you know Whirlwind, human?"_ To his surprise, the brown bird began to spin within the mini-storm in the other direction, negating the cage of wind it was in before flying off faster than anything Jace had seen fly.

He wasn't sure what to make of what he saw...

* * *

One of the first things Jace did that night when he went back to his home near the Embassy was open up every book he had in his study that related to all the various known fauna known to Ravnica, natural and artificial and everything in between as well as documentation from every guild that created their own creatures in one way or another to better handle arguements between guilds that wound up relating to them.

He could not find _anything_ linked to the two forms the creature took, nor anything listed that had known shapeshifting capabilities, out of at least 32 different books and 25 thick sets of documents from the many guilds, even among the Simic-related documentations.

"What could that be," he muttered to himself, plopping onto the bed before laying back in it. "I wish I had a clue to what I was dealing with..." Sitting up for the moment from the bed, the first thing he did was unclip the cloak he always wore around himself before pulling it onto his lap, finding himself tracing the white decorations embedded into it after a moment. After a couple of seconds did he stop before picking it up and gently tossing it toward a nearby dulled hook, the cloak landing upon it as if he had stood up and hung it instead. "Really glad I made Sundays a late day, I'm gonna need the sleep before I deal with the Conclave and possibly the Combine..."

He took a moment to change out of his normal attire and into simple dark-blue sleep clothes before curling up into bed, his mind refusing to rest properly even after falling into slumber...

* * *

The Blind Eternities, a hostile, dangerous realm which uses the color black as its canvas as it allows the colors of mana to paint themselves against it to create vivid displays of color in ornate and intricate ways humans like himself could only dream of replicating in reality.

The ultimate question, right now, was why was he dreaming of floating with the Blind Eternities? Was he having a premonition in his sleep? What's going on? And what happened to most of the color? Except for a few splotches here and there, he could only see spots of white everywhere against the black canvas.

_Greetings, Wanderer._

Jace wound up doing a full 360 in his place to try and see the source of the voice, but only made himself feel slightly sick to his stomach, which was strange in a dream. Was he dreaming?

_Well, you can say that you both are and are not dreaming._

"Show yourself," he couldn't help but cry out into the white-spotted blackness around himself, panic beginning to build. For all he knew, his consciousness could be trapped far away from his body, and that thought disturbed him.

_Fear not, Wanderer, you can say we..._

"...are in each other's minds at the same time." A girl in her mid-teens slowly fades into view before the mind mage, reddish-violet eyes that seemed forever sad despite the gentle smile on her face watching him from underneath the bangs of her dark-brown hair. Her outfit was simple, a black dress that reached down to halfway between her knees and ankles. The sleeves on her dress reached to between her elbow and wrist on each arm. At the collar, sleeve edges, around the waist and at the bottom edge of the dress was a band of yellow in each listed place. Her feet had black shoes that held no real decoration and white socks whose tops disappeared underneath the edge of the dress. "My name is Faye, and I have seen you before in my visions, Wanderer."

"Why do you call me that," Jace asked of the stranger, of Faye, in a cautious tone, his own awareness confirming her words about his thoughts being in two places at once. She simply glanced off to the side, moving some of her hair behind her ears with eerily-frail hands.

"Because neither of us are from this world, though only you can seem to choose when you can leave and where you can go. I do not know the proper term for such ability, though."

"Neither...you're a Planeswalker?" She simply looked back up toward the mindmage before slowly shaking her head.

"If that's the title your ability grants you, then no, I am not. But, like you, I have wandered the stars before." At this point did young Faye stretch out a hand before a small star landed in her palm, glittering brightly as she brought it closer to her. "I never touched a planet's surface before I turned 14, so they are more of a home to me than anything."

Jace couldn't help but stare at her after such a calmly-placed statement before glancing around the pair once again. He couldn't fathom out someone could survive in the Blind Eternities for so long, even he couldn-

"Is that what outer space is called in this realm? The Blind Eternities?" A more-amused smile emerged from the polite one Faye had at this question. "Sounds poetic."

"Were you reading my thoughts," Jace asked stunned after he turned to face her again, floating a step back as he did.

"I did say we were in each other's minds, dear elder." With this did she give a small polite bow toward the Planeswalker before standing up straight again. "Before we both awaken, would you be so kind as to give me your name?"

"...Jace." He felt uneasy giving her his name, though the way the star shimmered near her gave her a calming halo of sorts.

"Jace...it's funny, my adoptive brother bears the same name. We shall meet again, good sir. The stars have already forseen this." With another polite bow from the girl did the scene around him begin to fade from view...


	4. Not the Only Target

**Crossing Paths**

**Chapter 4: Not the Only Target**

Jace woke up with a monstrous headache that Sunday morning, one the mind mage was sure would end up lasting the entire day on him. Groaning a bit, he unceremoniously kicked the blanket off of him before getting up from the bed.

He felt like he was floating once he was standing, though he could clearly see that his feet were firmly planted upon the floor.

"Must have had a weird dream," he muttered before letting out a loud yawn and stretching up his arms toward the ceiling. Keeping his eyes closed, he tried to think back to whatever he may have seen or experienced in his sleep, but could not summon anything to his thoughts. "Wish I could remember it," he muttered in defeat before lowering his arms to either side of him. Glancing toward the device he used to keep time, a simple Izzet construct that showed what the current time was, he felt his heart begin to faster than normal once he realized what point of the day it was.

11:45am

He had fifteen minutes before the Selesnya trio returned to see him and he was nowhere near ready for them.

Spouting dark litanies in his head that he's sure would make the local demon of Ravnica blush a few shades of pink upon hearing them, Jace made haste in his getting ready for the day, almost leaving behind his favored cloak among many other mistakes he made in his rush...

* * *

If it wasn't for the enchantment on him that made the mindmage into the Living Guildpact of Ravnica, Jace was pretty sure Lavinia would have killed him already for how late he ended up being. Before daring to open the door, he did a mental scan of the first floor of the Embassy, trying to get a feel for whomever was inside. The Selesnya trio from yesterday were there, and thankfully he could feel their near-eternal patience without needing to read further into their minds. However...there was one mind that felt wrapped in chained anger...

_Jace, I know you're behind the door._

...and with that thought, he knew he was busted before he could even try to calm her from a distance. Lavinia probably felt him scanning the room and projected the thought rather-loudly. He has done it enough times for her to learn how to pick up on it, after all. Taking a deep breath to steady his nerves and brace for impact, he slowly opened the door to the building, though he saw more heads than he felt minds for, which prompted an eyebrow raise.

While he sensed correctly the Selesnya trio from yesterday and Lavinia, he had not sense the two males in the room, clearly Simic with the way they appeared with their discolored blue and green skin and literal sapphire hair underneath the strangest pair of laboratory coats he'd ever laid eyes on. And the Simic pair was infuriated, yelling toward the elves in the main room. How did he not hear them through the door? Or pick up on their minds, for that matter?

"Guildpact," one of them shouted, some of the rage in his voice leaking into the sudden cry.

_Here we go,_ he thought to himself as he sighed through his nose. "What is the problem today," he asked of the raging pair, casting a glance of pity toward the elves for dealing with the rage with more patience than he could ever muster up in his entire life.

"The Selesnya have made unfounded claims against the Simic for supposedly creating a shapeshifting creature to steal food from them! We would never stoop so low as to have our prized creations used for such petty tasks!"

"Only you would be capable of creating a creature capable of shapeshifting like that, Combine," the white-haired trio responded in unison before Jace let out a visible sigh, closing his eyes and leaning his head forward as he did.

"First of all," he started to say before re-opening his eyes and looking toward the Simic pair, crossing his arms as he did. "Why can't I sense either of your minds?" This caused the duo to glance toward each other before the slightly-taller one planted a hand with vine-like fingers onto his forehead.

"We forgot about the psy-blocks, Tari," he muttered before raising his other hand toward where his right ear would be on a human and pressing a spot against the discolored skin. Jace managed to not change facial expressions when he suddenly could feel one of the two minds. The shorter one, acquired a sheepish look on his feminine face and pressed the same spot near his right ear, allowing the mindmage to sense his mind as well.

"Sorry about that, we've had psychic intrusions into various minds in the past two days. Information taken would often being relating to general information about Ravnica, though...which we all thought everyone knew..." Arms still crossed, Jace brought one hand to his chin in thought, though his eyes did not leave the pair.

"Mind explaining what you mean by 'psychic'?" Both of the Simic looked at him funny at the question.

"You don't know what that means," they asked in unison, which prompted an eyebrow raise from the mind mage.

"No, I actually don't. I never actually heard of the term before last night." While the Simic males had their jaws dropped in shock, the Selesnya trio recaptured his attention with their words.

"You encountered the creature last night," they asked of him in curiosity, to which he nodded.

"As much as I hoped you were wrong, you were right on the shapeshifting," he started to say, which snapped the Simic pair out of their shock and forced them to listen in. "It can also project its thoughts. Don't know if it can read minds, though." At this moment did the Simic pair look toward each other with a creepy grin before bolting toward the exit, a grin that triggered a full-body shudder from Jace as he watched them leave. "And I suddenly feel very bad for the creature."

"We do not believe the Simic would act like that if the creature was theirs," the trio responed with a worried voice, recapturing his attention once again.

"Same here. Plus, if they were targeted as well, it's possible the creature was either Dimir or guildless, and I have no power if it turns out from the guildless."

The Selesnya looked toward each other before in worry before looking back toward Jace with their emerald eyes. "Understood, Guildpact Beleren." With this did they bow before heading out of the door.

"I guess the great mind mage doesn't know everything after all," he heard behind him before feeling a strong hand placed upon his shoulder, which was revealed to be Lavinia's deceptively-delicate hand. Jace couldn't help but lower his shoulders slightly at this verbal jab from one of his aids before trying to look toward her.

"You, too?" The armored lady walked around Jace, keeping a finger on his shoulder before standing in front of him with a visible smile, lightly bopping him on the nose with a dulled nail before moving out of his view and into another room. "Playing keepaway isn't funny, you know!"

"Who said it had to be," was the response he got before he clicked his tongue in annoyance at himself for being too respectful of others around him to just pull the knowledge from people's heads. What a fine start to the day already...


	5. The Strange Trio

_To Foxtrot Agent 21:_ Eh, you don't _quite_ know if the shapeshifter creature_ is _a Ditto or not. I will say that hopefully, you will like this particular portrayal of the character once fully revealed.

Oh, I failed to mention it, but the story art for this tale I did myself...I won't lie, I was never really hot at doing people to begin with. It's a minor miracle that I even did half-way decent with Jace outside of some minor variances.

* * *

**Crossing Paths**

**Chapter 5: The Strange Trio**

Another work-filled day makes the cloudless night feel more welcoming than the sunlit day often is, and Jace found himself looking up toward the many shimmering stars in the sky after finally getting a chance to wrap up his tasks for the day. "These guilds really will be the death of me," he muttered to himself before walking down the steps to the Embassy, hoping to get back to his home.

"Neos, I'm hungry."

"I know, Jace, all three of us are."

He had not been making any sounds in his steps, but the two voices he heard captured his attention, especially considering they sounded familiar... Wait a minute. He heard his first name again from the same set of voices he heard yesterday. Curiosity getting the better of him again, Jace pulled the hood of his cloak over his head and whispered something under his breath before suddenly appearing invisible to the world around him.

The blue mage spotted a trio of humans hiding in one of the empty stores among the streets, two of them children and one of them a full-grown man. Jace recognized the male child as the one with the same name as himself, dressed in mostly white with a short-sleeved shirt underneath both a brown sleeveless jacket and white scarf with yellow eyes poking out from underneath the kid's short brown bangs. The man of the three stood out greatly with his bright attire, a yellow suit jacket over a simple black shirt as well as purple pants and yellow dress shoes. He could see a faintly-glowing light-blue gem hanging over his chest from a simple string of gold. From this angle, he couldn't see the man's eyes from underneath the wide-brimmed yellow hat. The girl teen he couldn't help but feel a vague sense of familiarity from, the black dress trimmed with yellow edges and long dark-brown hair over reddish-violet eyes pulling from him strange feelings of knowing who she was.

Then a name came to him from somewhere deep within his own mind.

Faye.

"Neos, Jace and Faye," the mind mage silently repeated to himself before daring to cast a gentle web of awareness over the trio, wierding out slightly over repeating his own name in reference to someone else...

"Someone's nearby." The elder Jace could see the man, Neos, lift his head and look around with neon-green eyes, appearing to be sniffing the air as he did. "Someone of high rank, too."

Jace had not been banking on a human with that sharp a sense of smell, and he knew it after feeling his eyebrows go high up in surprise and his skin feeling paled. He couldn't make his scent disappear either, now that it had been caught, without possibly setting the man further on edge. He saw Neos stand up onto his feet before bringing a hand over his face and placing a thumb and finger on top of his closed eyes. When he saw the blue-haired man pull his hand from his face and reopened his eyes, Jace saw the strange-colored eyes being used to look around the area before falling upon his invisible self.

Behind the neon-green irises and the dark-green pupils, he could see the blue glow behind them as well as heard the near-bestial growl from his throat, just like with that shapeshifting creature from last night.

_"You,"_ Neos growled loudly, almost roaring instead, his weight shifting as if he was getting ready to jump forward and tackle the planeswalker to the ground from wherever he may be hidden. "Get your psychic ass out of here before I force you out."

Before Jace could even think to ask in his head how the man could see him, the girl of the trio, Faye suddenly dashed in front of the suited man, her back to Jace and her hands up in front of her. "Neos, wait! He won't harm you!" While it didn't eliminate the obvious rage on his face, her sudden movement did cause Neos to take a step back and give her an incredulous look.

"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't pop off the yellow-aura coward right now for hiding behind useless illusions." Jace gulped and closed his eyes for a second to steady his own breathing, unsure for once of what to do. He considered trying to calm the man's nerves by showing himself when a thought crossed his mind.

Did he just see through his illusions just like the shapeshifting creature did? And what's this about a yellow aura?

...were they one and the same?

"If you eliminate him, this particular world will collapse around him."

A heavy silence suddenly fell after those words were uttered, Jace almost didn't dare to breath and he could feel the rage being projected receding slightly. As horrible a reminder as it was, he did not dare argue it, not yet at least.

"Just like Terra would without the Emperor."

"As unfair a comparison that is, yes. Only this realm would destroy itself instead of outsiders destroying it." The mindmage balled up an invisible fist and gritted his teeth at the unknown comparison, hating being indirectly referred to as any form of royalty. Just six months ago, he had told Lavinia he was no emperor, he never pretended to be. To be compared to one anyway was almost cruel, though he figured it was a small price to pay to feel the brightly-colored stranger's projected rage start to recede. Finally daring to reopen his eyes and take a look back toward the trio, Jace was surprised to see a look of pity on Neos' face and the blue glow shining through his eyes to be gone as well.

"That kind of power overwhelms many mortals. We'll see in due time if he joins them or not." He waved a hand toward both of the children, who slowly approached him before wrapping a careful arm around the pair, closing his eyes as the trio began fade rapidly in and out of view, disappearing a moment later into the clear night air. After more than a minute did Jace finally move out of his hiding place, standing in the middle of where the trio once been sitting.

"Just who are you three?"


	6. Mental Wanderings

...I don't know if Vocaloid fans are gonna love me or kill me for something done in this chapter...

* * *

**Crossing Paths**

**Chapter 6: Mental Wanderings**

Even with the amount of chamomile tea he wound up drinking when he came home and the one attempt to use his own power to force himself to do so, Jace just could not seem to make himself fall asleep that night, tossing and turning upon the bed to try to find the one spot that could make him pass out for the night.

"Gods and demons," he muttered under his breath before finally sitting up, a tired look on his face that became even more noticable as he looked at the clock.

3am

And he fell backwards into the bed once more, nearly hitting the backboard with the back of his head. "Why can't I get them out of my head," he muttered as he covered his face with his hands, though it turned into a growl halfway in.

_Because the fact that your illusions are useless against one of them disturbs you,_ he heard his own mind echo back at him, prompting him to turn onto his side. _Plus, the chance the same one's a shapeshifter._

Jace couldn't repress the shudder that thought triggered, even if it was right. He's had bad experiences with shapeshifters in the past, specifically in the form of the Dimir guildleader, Lavaz. He looked up toward the small window in the room, which allowed the moon's light to shine in and keep the place from appearing constantly dark, hoping the gentle light could ease his nerves for once.

But sadly, it wasn't meant to be.

Punching his pillow, he got up out of bed in only his sleep clothes, making his way to the simple-decorated kitchen to try and find something to ease his nerves. "I'm half-tempted to just remove them from my head," he muttered in annoyance before discovering upon the pale-blue counter a folded sheet of paper. Curious as to how the note got there without him sensing anyone nearby, Jace cautiously grabbed hold of the note and unfolded it, an eyebrow going up at what it said.

_I apologize for Neos' belligerence. He's not really had good experiences with psykers like us in the past._

_\- Faye_

"Psykers like...us," he muttered to himself before shaking his head in building aggravation that was not helping him sleep and looking up in thought. "What's a psyker?"

* * *

It was mornings like this that made Jace thankful for whomever originally came up with coffee, for he certainly needed it to stay awake that morning, especially since he did not sleep at all that night. In all honesty, he wouldn't be surprised if Niv-Mizzet had a hand in its creation. It would seem mad enough for the old dragon to come up with needing, after all. Working on his third cup, his eyes wandered toward the strange letter he found on the counter in the middle of the night, narrowing his blue eyes at it. He didn't exactly see the girl as the kind that would sneak into his place, or even know where it was, so how did it get there in the first place?

"I hope I'm not starting to get rusty," he groaned to himself before grabbing the note and folding it up smaller with a single hand. He knew he had to get going soon, though he did not want to have to deal with a pair of Simics that would probably go after that man...creature...argh!

And his head met the counter, a resounding thud ringing throughout the place from it before wrapping his arms around it.

"If this keeps up, I _will_ remove that trio from my head," he almost roared before lifting his head. "There's no way a human can shapeshift like _that_...is there?" Shaking his head, Jace simply went to the sink to rinse off his empty cup before leaving it behind and heading back to his room...

* * *

"Jace, you look like hell."

_I __**feel**__ like hell..._

Jace simply walked into the building that day with his cloak covering his whole person almost, not even bothering to raise his head to speak and projecting his thoughts seemed to take less energy than actually speaking at that moment. He could feel Councilor Lavinia's gaze upon his back and could barely even summon the energy to lift his head when he felt a gentle hand placed onto his back, despite all the coffee he drank earlier.

"Go take a rest, I'll call you if you're actually needed." Barely turning his head toward her, Jace only managed a halfhearted smile before walking past her, knowing full well it would not be long before he was summoned back down.

But until then...

Where the _hell_ was he?

Jace last recalled passing out literally on a cot he had spotted in one of the offices, and yet here he was among the crowds near the Embassy, floating through them...wait, floating? Had he become so tired he actually seperated from his body? He didn't seem to be anywhere near the building he fell asleep in!

_Come here._

He didn't exactly hear a voice as much as he felt one pull him toward a particular direction, unneeding to move around the many people in the crowd as he moved on forward through them like a ghost or a spirit. Though he did not have ears to hear with at the moment, he could have sworn he faintly heard singing, which confused him.

"Aiiro no sora, biryuushi no koukaku.

Hizashi wa shizumi, yamijaku ni hibiku kikaion..."

The floating soul was sure that whatever was being quietly sung was in a language that was not native to Ravnica in any way, a clear sign of a Planeswalker, if he ever heard one. Whispering under a breath he did not have, the mindmage casted upon himself a spell that thankfully allowed him to understand and speak whatever language he may wish.

"Aa, sekai ga susande...even so, will I still love you?

It's perfectly clear - but how can I

Send this signal to you?"

_A strange melody,_ Jace thought to himself before daring to float closer, stopping at the sight of an increasingly-familiar yellow jacket and hat.

It was that strange man singing the odd song in the middle of the crowded street, not seeming to care who stopped to stare at the stranger with the kids.

"I'll protect you - this is war.

Just seeing you so hurt...

Losing my head over love is a sin,

I'll make you understand I can't stand to be apart from you."

_Why would someone sing such a melody and in the middle of the street, no less,_ the spectral Jace thought to himself before feeling a tug pulling him away from the trio harder and harder. Realizing in a few seconds that someone was trying to possibly wake him up, he gave a silent sigh before catching one of the two kids looking back toward him, the girl named Faye, looking back at him with a knowing look and smiling at him sweetly before he lost awareness of his surroundings...


	7. Shattered Barrier

**Crossing Paths**

**Chapter 7: Shattered Barrier**

"...his...starting to...again..."

"...begin...stir..."

Whatever he was laying on was rather-uncomfortable, stiff even, and his head hurt a lot more than normal. He could feel a large collection of minds around him, but only a select few felt familiar to him somehow.

He felt his left hand, his ungloved hand, beginning to twitch slightly as he started to feel uncomfortable prickling in it, a finger brushing against something that felt like a single feather laying flat on whatever he was laying on.

...wait, feather?

With effort did he begin to open his eyes, the first thing entering his view being a rather-ornate chandelier upon the simple white ceiling with 10 different jewels specially grown and cut to represent each one of Ravnica's guilds with their appropriate colorations.

"...Jace?"

That sounded like two voices at once, voices the blue mage should recognize, yet Jace was still too out of it to make heads or tails of anything. Blinking his eyes slowly, his gaze fell to his right, toward a large window that almost engulfed the entire wall. On the other side of the clear glass was a view of the nearby streets filled with people of almost all walks of life. It was a view that often made him forget the station life saw fit to throw him into, envisioning himself walking among the people when he wasn't quite allowed to leave just yet.

"I think he's still out of it, Lavinia. Astral projection can drain someone unprepared for it."

_...oh, don't tell me I was right,_ he managed to think to himself in the equal of a low slurred mumble before slowly blinking again and looking away from the window.

"Make that _really_ out of it. Even that thought sounded slurred."

_...I projected that...?_

"Yes, you did."

Managing to lean his head toward his left, Jace could see he was in an office of some sort, a large one that appeared meant to occassionally hold a decent number of beings within it at once, though nothing truly large. While he vaguely recognized the armored woman in blue and silver, Lavinia, the other he was not expecting to see.

Pointed ears made themselves visible through the blonde, almost-white hair though his focus found themselves upon eyes that seemed to simply sidestep whatever mental defenses he may have had. There had been only one soul native to Ravnica that did that to him, and he found himself gulping for reasons he wasn't sure of himself.

"Emmara," the mind mage asked weakly, still feeling the glazed-over sensation on his eyes as he looked upon the elven maiden that once had his heart, that sometimes still steals it away from him when he's not keeping up his guard. Jace was not expecting to see her suddenly blush then look away from him, however.

"You need to rest, you're projecting everything you're thinking..." A blush fell upon his own cheeks at the realization that crossed his own mind, a subconscious apology forming in his thoughts as Jace tried to get up into a sitting position. Once in a cross-legged position did he realize that what he had been laying on was his rather-large desk of blue-webbed marble and birch wood in the Embassy and that the feather he felt earlier was one of the quills that thankfully wasn't in an ink jar. But why was he here instead of on that cot he spotted before passing out?

Or did he not make it to that?

"You didn't even make it into the room before passing out."

That response then made him wonder if he hit the ground head-first from lack of sleep. He did have a large enough headache for it. Wincing slightly as he tried to stand shakily upon his feet, he felt himself stumble and almost fall forward toward the ground. The only reason he wasn't on the floor was he felt chained armor and someone holding him up from in front of him, a thought that made him feel even more embarrassed.

"I'm not that..."

"Yes, sir, you are that bad off."

Oh, boy, Lavinia doesn't call him that outside of Embassy meetings unless something was really wrong. Hanging his head in defeat, he allowed the armored lady from the Azorius Senate to shift his weight so that he had an arm over her to better walk him to another area. "I'm just glad you live close by. You're pretty heavy."

_Only time you're getting away with that..._

"Oh, am I," she asked in amused challenge.

He just went to pull his hood over his head, though he was surprised when he wound up grabbing air. A second later, he felt a familiar heavy cloth being draped over him before Emmara moved in front of him to clip it secure.

"This is one problem you need to see the Simic or Izzet for," Emmara spoke just before he lifted his head toward her. "I may be a healer, but even I don't know how to heal this problem."

_...just my luck..._

* * *

He did not want to be here.

He really did not want to be here.

As much as he knew what the Simic did was useful in the long run, he _really_ did not want to be here.

"Quit being a coward, Jace," he heard Lavinia say near him as she lightly jabbed an elbow into his side as the pair approached the Simic guildhall, Zameck, his hood almost completely covering both his head and his face.

Oh, his cowardice was currently justified. He did not exactly look forward to giving the guild a chance to possibly experiment on possibly _the_ one telepath in Ravnica to get his uncontrolled thought projection issue fixed. The few times he has to oversee some of their more-dangerous experiments were flooding his own thoughts, which caused quite a few beings around them to move away in a bit of fear.

"You think way too much for your own good."

"I'm not used to people hearing what I think," Jace verbally quipped through clenched teeth after reaching into his hood with both hands to grip hard the hair at the back of his head in frustration. "It's usually the other way around."

"Now you know how others feel about you snooping in their heads, Beleren."

From under his blue hooded cloak did the mindmage glare toward the Councilor with narrowed eyes, a growl on his throat. She had her back toward him at the moment, through she didn't need to turn toward him to shake a finger at him from behind.

"Temper, temper."

The blue mage let out both a powerful psychic cry as well as a loud verbal yell of anger at the same time, which cleared almost everyone outside of the guildhall that didn't suddenly drop unconscious away from him...


	8. Silence Inside the Mind

Have I ever mentioned that I hate seizures? If I haven't, then I'll say it here. I **_hate_** having to deal with the aftermath of a seizure, where I feel like Jace did after the one time he mindsculpted himself...which I _still_ say had to be a hell of a trick.

* * *

**Crossing Paths  
Chapter 8: Silence Inside the Mind**

The longer he had to stay in this particular white room, the more and more Jace began to panic from being left alone with only his thoughts for company. Only a few minutes passed since some of the Simic directed him to stay in this particular room that was supposedly to disallow mental projections from passing through, but he had no way to know.

He did know that he could sense nothing beyond the walls, even when he saw one of the members of this guild pass by the currently-sealed door, which had a window that had been crystallized in a way to make it impossible to tell he would be looking at if he looked through it. He had heard this room be called an 'observation room', though he couldn't tell how they would be watching him. It didn't look like there were any obvious methods of watching someone in the way of enchanted gems or illusions hiding anything that would transmit what was seen and heard. And with the enchantment in the walls suppressing his ability to send out thoughts beyond the wall as well as receive them, he couldn't be sure of anything that was going on.

It was making him paranoid being left in silence like this. _Is this what it was like to not be able to innately read minds, _he wondered to himself as he sat upon the thinly-padded cot in the small room, bringing his knees to his head and wrapping his arms around them both. The silence made for a lonely way to pass the time, making him wonder more and more what people not like him would do to make time seem to fly by faster.

It couldn't have been even five minutes and it already felt like an hour passed in this tiny room. It felt like the walls were slowly closing in on him and he couldn't planeswalk out of here to relieve such oppression without drawing a whole lot of attention and possibly causing panic, either. It was driving him insane, though it shouldn't even come close to starting.

"Why did I have to be born with this curse," he muttered to himself as he placed his forehead on his knees, closing his eyes as he subconsciously scratched the back of his neck with one hand...

...if only he knew there had been an eye on him this whole time, just not one he could perceive.

* * *

Fifteen minutes of total silence both physically and in his mind felt like pure torture that lasted for hours for the man as he tossed and turned on the cot while still balled up into himself. He wasn't sure what was more torturous, this and the resulting soul-crushing loneliness that came with it or being in that magic-negating cage while Baltrice scorched him with smoke and heat and made it almost impossible to breath at times when he was younger. At least in the latter, he wasn't alone, even if he was with his torturer...

A click became heard and Jace immediately returned to a sitting position facing the door, though he was crossed-legged upon the bed. Though the being that walked in after Lavinia and Emmara surprised him a bit to see.

"Prime Speaker Zegana," Jace asked with a confused look, taking in the merfolk's ornate appearance as he did. He was quick to note that all three of them was wearing something over their right ear, the 'psy-blocks' he heard the Simic members in his office earlier call them. They didn't seem surgically attached to either Lavina or Emmara, thankfully.

"Guildpact," she started with a flat tone to her voice. "We may have found a pair of potential solutions to your current problem, one more permanent than the other."

Jace couldn't help but look at the merwoman funny.

"How," he flatly asked. "I haven't seen, heard or felt any of you do anything yet."

She simply pointed toward his gloved hand, which he looked at while scratching an annoying itch that has shown up at the back of his neck.

There were extremely-tiny white spores upon it, small enough for him to actually miss before it was brought to his attention. "They're sensation spores, designed to monitor patients with minimal invasiveness and are best used on first-time patients, those whom fear most medical practices or those whose well-being are of higher priority than normal."

As the Living Guildpact, Jace figured the last reason applied for him, allowing a fair bit of relief to wash over him. Admittedly, considering some of the more...disturbing ways the Simic Conclave as a whole could find out what was wrong with a being, he found himself glad he normally wouldn't have to go through such under normal circumstances. "I do have to ask, why were you on the verge of insanity a moment long ago?"

Jace looked at her stunned. He really was starting to turn insane from the silence? Was he really that dependent on his ability to read minds to stay sane? He simply looked down upon his legs, unable to figure out a way to answer that question.

"I really don't know," Jace finally responded, leaning his head forward again. "That was the first time I've been completely cut off like that for any length of time."

A silent nod came from Zegana, who placed her slightly-elongated fingers upon her chin in thought as she kept a studious gaze upon Jace's form. The mindmage couldn't help but give a slight shudder after catching the look himself upon slightly looking up, wondering if he had ever given such a look to others in the past. "That...rules out one of the options for the time being." Only upon his giving her a confused look did she dare to elaborate. "The more-permanent option would have required surgery of a somewhat-exploratory nature to repair the damage to your physical mind. However, after seeing how you reacted when you couldn't use your abilities, this may not be wise."

"What is the other option," Emmara asked of the Simic guild leader before he could, prompting the merfolk to lower her hand.

"There is a spell that can be used to prevent you from projecting out unless you actually try to project your thoughts..." Even with everyone wearing those strange devices, the psy-blockers as they were called, Jace just knew there was a catch from how the guild leader let her sentence hang.

"What's the catch?"

Zegana looked around the relatively-small room for a brief moment before looking back toward Jace. "It seems to only function when the person it's cast upon is conscious. While asleep, you will need to be in a room that functions like this one to keep your thoughts to yourself while you sleep."

And Jace allowed his forehead to meet his knees with a light bit of force...


End file.
