<span style="font-style: italic">“...and in other news, the Weather Bureau is monitoring a low-pressure area north of the mainland...”</span><br/><br/>Akira listened with vague interest, her mind more preoccupied with washing the dishes rather than the radio. Her apartment in the city wasn’t in a flood-prone area anyway, thank God, and this area of the mainland wasn’t going to be hit directly. Still, the university would probably suspend classes. “Hurray,” she mused out loud. While she enjoyed the challenges of the classroom, she wasn’t one to miss out on celebrating a free day.<br/><br/>It had been four years since she had last been something other than herself. She had thought it would be difficult, next to impossible, really, to reintegrate into a mundane Earth after spending years in other worlds so different from it. She couldn’t imagine being just Akira--twenty years old, Asian, unremarkable, with hands that hold up the weight of her own fate, and only her own.<br/><br/>Anybody who saw her in the street wouldn't be able to tell that this short-haired gal with the medium build was a world-traveler, tasked with the protection of the multiverse at the age of twelve. Now she was finishing her first year at college. A tad delayed, she would say with a laugh to her fellow first-years three or four years her juniors, whenever they asked her about it, some bringing it up casually, others with embarrassed looks, as if afraid to talk to their elders. She did her best not to be annoyed; after all, when you were in your early teens, anybody beyond fifteen was a senior citizen to you. And the students who<span style="font-style: italic">were</span>her age, or were supposed to be her batchmates? They would have finished high school the same year she had ‘retired’, would have either finished college or have ‘gone immortal’ with the years under their belt.<br/><br/>She looked down at the plate she was washing, checked to see if there was any grease left, finally putting it on the rack to dry. Through the window she could see storm clouds gathering. Huh. Storm’s early. Yawning, she walked towards her balcony--a luxury, given how small her apartment was--so she could let in some of the cool air. She wasn’t a fan of flood, but she loved the smell of rain--<br/><br/>Nope. Not this one.<br/><br/>Akira recoiled as if shot, stumbling backwards into her room, wild eyes fixed upon the swirling clouds. Now that she had felt the wind, she could see other things as well: how the clouds were just the<span style="font-style: italic">wrong</span>shade of violet; the threat of red lightning; the crackling in the air of invisible things rubbing against your skin. The last time she had felt this otherworldly static was when she was on Earth,<span style="font-style: italic">her</span>Earth, the world of her birth, shortly before her life had permanently ceased to be normal. “Anomaly,” she breathed, the word escaping her before she could censor it and pretend it wasn’t real. “Oh god, oh god, oh god,” she went, sprinting to her dresser.<br/><br/>Under layers of socks and underwear lay the most innocent-looking little box. She forgot where she had gotten that thing, but no matter how many articles of clothing she dumped over it, she could never forget what’s inside it. With trembling hands she opened it, winced as the sapphire ring inside flashed repeatedly despite the absence of bright light nearby.<br/><br/>She spent the next few hours hiding under her blanket, pretending that, yes, it was perfectly acceptable to nap the day away even when she had only just finished brunch. When the thunder sounded, Akira muttered a string of curses and pulled the blanket away from herself. Okay, if her Muggle-life here was going to be unceremoniously upended, she would rather it be on her own terms. First time it had happened, trouble came to find her; she wasn’t going to let it dictate her first move this time around.<br/><br/>It had begun to rain. While everyone who didn’t have an umbrella or jacket scrambled for cover, Akira walked out into the drizzle as if oblivious to the weather. God, she felt naked, going out like this with only a hoodie to protect her from whatever the hell it was that might manifest from the other side of that rip in space-time. Granted, there was metal all around her she could use, but it had been four years since she had tapped into the Ring’s power. Sure, she could still move metal without it, but it was kid’s stuff without the Ring amplifying it. “Like riding a bike,” she muttered under her breath. Anyway, who said that anything bad was going to happen at all? Akira almost laughed out loud at how ridiculous that statement sounded in her head.