Woe to the Days of Fire & Death

The Man of the Crowd

Zander woke gently as the train shook to a stop. He stood and stretched, waiting for his turn to exit the train. He took a deep breath, stepping onto the subway platform and made his way up onto the busy streets of the city.

He walked until he found Times Square, taking a picture for his Instagram later. Then he headed to Rockefeller Center. As he was walking down the streets, he found a cart that was selling Enid's favorite, Snoods. He grabbed a purple one for her, seeing as she already had a pink one. He shoved it in his backpack before quickly continuing down the streets.

The streets of New York City were busy seeing as it wasn't too late in the night. It was roughly about 11 pm. He could hear the sounds of drunk people screeching in bars, cars honking every 2 seconds for moving an inch, and the rumble of the subways below. This was Zander's favorite as it was loud enough to pull him from his thoughts.

Once in Rockefeller, he took a picture here for later as well. As he went to leave, he could tell that there were some unavoidable eyes watching him. Annoyed, he thought Mace and his mother had caught up, but he couldn't see them. It didn't make the hair on the back of his head go down, any less. Turning every which way, he watched some dark hooded figures make their way towards him like a scene out of one of his action movies.

Zander, not wanting any part in these hooded figures, sprinted down the streets of New York, his demise sprinting behind him.

The fireball made his way all the way to Central Park. As he was passing the Plaza hotel, he looked back to see if the hooded men were still behind, not watching where he was going and full on impacted into whatever was in front of him and rolled.

There was an audible "Oof!" and the body rolled with him. Zander, slowly got up, his wrist was killing him from that roll. He looked up, watching as some security-type men helped the other man up, who looked very rich and very important.

"Watch where you're going kid!" One of the security guards scolded but was stopped by the important looking man.

"It's okay. Go take care of them." The rich guy pointed to Zander's hooded men. As the hooded men watched the security guys make their way towards them, they stopped and slowly turned, running away.

"Are you okay? You look like you sprained your wrist." The rich guy made his way over to Zander, checking out the teens wrist causing him to hiss in pain.

"Ow! Stop!" Zander pushed the man away, holding his wrist which was throbbing in pain.

"Hmm. You're a little firecracker aren't you?" The man chuckled rhetorically. "Come on, lets go get that wrist fixed up."

"I'm not going anywhere with you." Zander glared at the man he ran into. He didn't trust some rich prick.

The man turned around, an eyebrow raised, exuding a dominant aura. "Excuse me? I think you owe me considering you just tackled me."

Zander swallowed hard. He didn't know why, but the amount of scary, that the man was giving off, made Z want to obey and go with him.

"Let's go. Now." The man stared the teen down, practically demanding the teen to obey, not asking. Zander huffed and rolled his eyes.

"Fine. But if you touch me or kill me I will haunt you with my dead corpse." The young dragon threatened.

It was the wealthy man's turn to roll his eyes. He led the teenager towards a black SUV where one of the security guards opened the door. The man got in after Zander, who thought it was very creepy and he definitely thought he was going to die tonight.

The car ride was quiet as the man typed away on his phone, probably doing some important business-y type work that Zander could never see himself do. When the car stopped, Zander was slightly scared, but held his composure as he was directed out and towards a very fancy looking apartment complex. The security guards followed behind as they entered the apartments, heading straight to the elevators. The rich man scanned a key card in the elevator and the two made their way up, the security guards remaining on the ground floor.