2 Chapter 1: Auto Shop

There was a massive explosion of people awakening strange and terrifying gifts every day, all over the globe. Thanks to that, World War 3, which was close to hand, was put on hold. That is until each, and every country could study and weaponize these people who had awakened these so-called gifts.

Humanity was able to usher in a new era of technological advancements and prosperity. Thanks in part to the research done on the powers of gifted individuals, and the much needed increased landmass, which helped with the overpopulation crisis that humanity was facing.

But alas, not everyone was able to share in, on the increased bounty….

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Date: December 20, 2077.

Location: Twin Cities, Minnesota.

"Yo, Magnus!" shouted a short and heavyset man. He had muscled arms from working out, and a weather-beaten face from being out in the open air. Calluses and blisters covered his fingers. Furthermore, you could also notice a tattoo extending out from his oily blue-stained shirt, all the way up to his neck.

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"Why the hell, do you keep on talking to him, Nicolas?" Asked a tall and lanky man, with slightly crossed eyes. "He is an idiot!" He yelled as spittle flew out of his mouth.

The man, no the young man, that they have been talking about, took his head out the car's hood. He used a piece of cloth to wipe away his hand, as he studied the two men with a lazy gaze; like they were nothing more than clowns putting on a dull show, seen day after day.

He looked to be in his early twenties. He had soft black hair in a ponytail, with an oval-shaped face, and a button nose. Round amber-colored eyes, sometimes nearing gold, with a straight eyebrow. He was nearly 2 meters tall, well-built, and evenly proportioned all around. His fingers were covered in calluses, blisters, and engine greasy. You could even notice a smudge of black greasy on his clean-shaven cheek.

His skin was smooth, and the tone of warm, bronze color. He was a handsome young man that could catch the eyes of many young women. Plus, the dirt and sweat lent him a rugged, rough, look that was attractive in its own right.

'What the fuck, do these two idiots want this time? Magnus Clade asked himself silently. Do they not have any shame! The two of them look like, they are in their mid-forties, and they still got the courage to continue acting like gangsters!'

He gave them one more withering look and shook his head internally. Then he got back into the hood of the flying car, in front of him.

"Shut your trap, Daniel. Just because somebody does not want to blabber on and on like you, does not mean they are an idiot." Nicolas said with a dangerous tone, not noticing that the person he wanted to chat with, had decided to ignore him and his lackey, completely.

"You have no idea who you are dealing with here. This guy..." Nicolas said as he pointed his finger at Magnus' direction, without really looking at the young man. "has graduated from OAS Mecha University!"

Daniel looked at his buddy in suspicion, "What the fuck is he doing here, in an auto mechanic shop, if he is some big shot that graduated from one of the best Mecha schools in the U.S.?"

Nicolas looked up and down at his friend... no scratch that, his minion, then grabbed the front of his shirt. He lowered his minion down to his eye level and asked him coldly. "Are you doubting what I am saying, Daniel?"

Daniel waved his boney arms around in surrender, and answered back in a shaky voice, "No... no, I was not, bro! I was only trying t-"

Nicolas cut him off before he could finish whatever he was saying. He glared down at his minion with unconcealed menace in his eyes, and Daniel loudly gulped when he saw that look on his boss's face. The minion immediately went limp in his boss's arms. He would have also pissed himself if Nicolas was not generous enough to let him go when he got the response he wanted.

After the short man let go of his minion, who straight away dropped on to the ground. Nicolas nodded to himself, in some sort of congratulatory manner for terrifying his minion and teaching him a good lesson. He looked down at his follower, who was sprawled on the ground and spoke up to him, in an icy tone. "Let me make myself very clear, Daniel. I do not want that ever to happen again, okay?"

Daniel hastily nods his head in acknowledgment, like the good servant he was.

Nicolas turned back to face Magnus, who was enamored over this drama unfold right before his very eyes. Nicolas cleared his throat and said in a bright and cheerful tone, "Sorry, you had to see that."

The young man groaned internally in his mind and thought to himself, 'buddy can't you see that I want to ignore you. Must I embarrass you, so that you could leave me alone? Ahhh, if I did that, I would be starting a fight with cavemen, and that would be totally annoying. Sight, I guess I will have to wait until he gets it out of his system.'

Nicolas carries along with his evil boss monologue, all the while not knowing that the man he is talking to, has started to get annoyed with him. "My boy here likes to wag his tongue too much sometimes. Isn't that right, Daniel?"

Daniel hastily nods his head and nervously chunks. "Yeah, boss, it gets the best of me sometimes." He said after he notices that the danger has passed.

Magnus glanced over at the two idiots, especially the tall one. 'Nothing more than a spineless dog, the young man thought disgustingly. All bark, no bite! Well, never mind them, this time I am really getting back to work, while they continue to yak on.'

With that thought, Magnus went on to ignore both of the men for the second time in a row. All the while, they continued to blabber on, while not knowing that whatever they are saying, is just being spoken out loud for their own benefit and no one else.

"Anyways, my cousin, Arno, he got his hands on an Ultralight Mecha suit. I want you, Magnus, to work on it for a bit. I told him you are the best out there, an OAS Mecha graduate. We are willing to pay you 400k, 200k upfront, and 200k after you are done. How does that sound, man?"

Magnus immediately ceased with whatever he was doing under the car's hood, completely reneging on his earlier promise to himself. He lost grip over the tool in his hands and banged his head against the car's hood, but all of that did not matter to the young mech builder. All that did was the words that Nicolas has just spoken.

What does one do nowadays when you have superpowered individuals running amok and causing all sorts of mischief? Bullets won't work since they can be blocked, rockets can be dodged, tanks can be destroyed, and cops can be easily killed.

What does one do?

The solution is very straightforward once you think about it for a bit. And it has been proven to work by the greatest gifted man alive.

Mecha suits!

It is effortless, and any halfwit could understand the idea behind it. You put together all of your weapons of mass destruction, then outfit it onto one machine. Then out comes a machine bred for war and destruction.

Magnus looked at the two men with suspicion in his gaze, yet, deeper within those eyes was a pang of hunger that dwarfed all rational thoughts when the offer was made.

'It has been a very long time since I have been able to touch a Mech suit, not ever since I have graduated, the young man thought to himself. I knew that, deep down, this would lead to a slippery slope. But, I could use the money since my mother's hospital bills won't be paying itself,' a small part of the young man motioned.

Before the young mech builder could answer them, an old gruff toned voice speaks up. "What the hell am I pay you for Nicolas, Daniel, huh? Is it to stand around, talk, and look pretty for me."

An older gentleman with fine, greying hair and a similar color goatee walked up to the three men as a scowl played on his square jaw face. He had a left prosthetic leg, a crappy one at that since you could notice from the way he continued to limp and lean on to his cane, whenever he walked. Yet he had a light tanned, chiseled body, with tough, scarred skin.

The old man walked up to the two gangsters, slowly and steady. As he got closer and closer, they start trembling, and it is for good reason that they are scared and nearly pissing their pants.

The old man is the owner of this shop, and if that does not scare you enough, he could easily kick your ass. I kid you not!

There was this one block, a while back, who tried to test the boss' patience. He did not end up well at all. The ambulance had to come and pick him up from the shop. He had left this place, bleeding from all over and with dozens of broken bones. To top it all off, the police charged him with aggravated assault. It seemed like the old man had buddies at the police station.

The old man stopped just a few inches away from the two men and asked in a voice barely over a whisper. "What should I do with the two of you boys, huh?" He asked them with a blank look on his face.

The two old gangsters stayed as silent as they can be when the boss flung that question at them. It was as though a cat literally got their tongues. The old man looked at them for a bit, with a stink eyed look, then he finally spoke up once more. "How does two more hours of unpaid work, sound for the both of you, huh?"

Since judgment has been passed down upon them, the two do not dare, at all, to refuse; even though this was sort of employment abuse. They hastily nod their heads in acknowledgment, to the decree that the old man has passed down.

The old man waved his cane threateningly at them and added, on a final note. "Now stop staring at me like some gits and get back to work."

With that final command, the two men quickly took their tools and equipment, then scramble away like frightened rats.

"Fucking idiots!" Said the older man, under his breath. Magnus clearly heard it and looked at the old man with his eyebrows raised. The young man asked jokingly, "why the hell do you even hire them for, Boss. If they are so useless?"

The old man turned upon the handsome young adult and looked at him like he was the biggest imbecile. "Why else, boy, except for cheap labor, huh!" He growled out, then as quick as that his attitude changed, "Anyways I told you to stop calling Boss. It is Grandpa Richard to you."

"Fine, fine. Grandpa Richard!" The young man said defeatedly. "You happy now, old man?" He added, with no ill will, just amusement and goodwill. Then he quickly got back to finishing up the car in front of him, before the old man changes his attitude and goes on slinging verbally insults.

The young man was expecting an impromptu reply from the old man, but it was absolute silence on the old man's end. Magnus stuck out his head from the hood and saw that the old man had a blank look on his face. Misunderstanding that look, the young man started to panic and asked in a worried tone. "Hey, Grandpa Richard, did you forget your medicine today?" Now, this is some serious shit.

As the new era came around, a new, unfathomable sickness popped up.

At first, when the new era came rolling in, there was no sign of this sickness found anywhere. As the years went by, random people started to show signs of this sickness. Nobody cared about it since strange things were happening every day all over the world, and it was just only a handful of people.

But as time went by, more and more people started to get this sickness, until it swept through the whole world. Only then did world leaders and leading doctors have to take this seriously, but it was far too late and too little. Over 30% of the global population had symptoms of this sickness. And this was not your normal sickness since over time people started to turn to dust!

Yes, Dust! People unanimously started to call it the Dust Disease.

Right now, the only people who can be diagnosed and treated are those who have shown early signs nowadays. But for those who are so far in, and contracted this disease early on, nothing can be done for them.

That is why it is essential for the old man to take his medicine. If he dares to skips out on only just one dosage, the disease could act up, and he might lose another leg.

Grandpa Richard snorted at the mecha builder's question, "Of course I didn't skip my prescription drug. I am not an idiot like you. Don't look at me like that boy. You are the biggest idiot that there is."

At the old man's outburst, the mech builder knew that he got caught red-handed, so all he could do really was to turn away from the old man, feeling ashamed. Grandpa Richard has always been there for the young man, through good times and bad times. And the Magnus owes him too much to even count. So when the old got to bashing, rightly so, all he could really do was turn around in shame.

"You do know what the punishment is for possessing, building, or fixing a Mech suit without a license is, right?"

"Yeah, yeah. I do, Grandpa." The young man said to him in a nonchalant matter, trying to subconscious dissuade him from continuing to talk about this topic.

"Then why were you going to do it, huh, boy?" Grandpa Richard asked the handsome man, with a grimace set in his face.

"I was not…" As the young man tried to deny the old man's accusation, Grandpa Richard held out his hand, interrupting him mid-sentence. "Don't try to lie to me, boy. I saw the look on your face… You wanted it, really bad."

"Fine!" The young man shouted as he raised his hands up in surrender and anger. "I just wanted a quick buck, to help pay for my mother's hospital bill. You happy now, old man!"

"I believe that lame excuse when pigs would fly, boy. I pay you more than enough for you to pay for your mother's hospital bill. You know, and I know why you did it..." The old man said with an intelligent gleam in his eyes, and that got the young man's blood boiling, that all-knowing attitude and that explicit offhand mention of his 'fall.'

The old man either did not notice or choose to ignore the young man's wrathful look completely. "Anyways, correct me if I am wrong, but this would never have happened, right? You wouldn't have been strapped for cash and unable to ever touch a mech suit. Ahh, if you had not d-"

"Alright, Stop! I get what you are trying to say old man, but you do not have to rub it in my face EVERY SINGLE TIME. It was not my fault that I got my license revoked; it was that fucking, little, dickless, bastard. Not ME!"

Even with that loud explosive acclamation, the old man kept a calm, serene, look on his face. Something that only a person that has weathered through much and seen even more grand sights through his long life.

With that patient look on his face, Richard spoke once more, as he rubbed his grey beard. "You do know that if you kept your head down, you would not have been here… in an auto repair shop."

And the way he said that, especially that last part, nearly set off the young man again. But he clenched his jaw, to calm the angry course through his head.

Still keeping up that tranquil look, and that annoying, all-knowing attitude, the old man flicked the mech builder on the forehead and asked him. "You got anything to add to the long list of dumb things, you did or almost where going to do?"

"No, but I got a question." Said the young man, but before continued on, he took in a deep breath. When he spoke up this time, it was in a toned-down voice, but it was clearly laced with venom. "You're your advice is that I should be keeping my head down like a good dog and scraping whenever my betters pass through, huh?"

At my question, grandpa Richard turned away from Magnus, and gone was the hard expression his face took on when he was bashing in Magnus, verbally. "Yes!"

And that answer was filled with untold bitterness and sadness, so much pain that it could fill countless oceans. He let out a long, excruciating sigh before he spoke up, and when he did, his tone was back to hard. "We live in a world that is being taken over by beings who can do unimaginable things. We are just regular mortals, the only thing we could do is to keep our head down and avoid them."

The old man stopped looking down at the floor and turned to face the young man head-on, and in his eyes where the look of a man, who surrendered to his place in this new world, one at the bottom.

"You cannot always be angry, sarcastic, and not give a shit about the world, boy. Those sorts of attitudes will make you wind up in a very bad place."

Now, it was the old man, who was in an angry mood, and the young one, who was in a calm mood. Magnus calmly closed the car's hood and started to put away all the tools and equipment. "I am finished fixing up your car. Therefore I am done for the day." He said, then added casually, "Also I am young, so unless I experience all those things by myself, I will not bend my back."

Grandpa Richard looked at his old subordinate's son and closed his eyes in weariness, all he said before Magnus headed out the door was. "I will see you tomorrow at work, boy, alright?"

Magnus continued to walk away, but he waved his right hand and said out loud, "Yeah, see tomorrow, old man!"

But what Magnus did not know, was that today will be the last day he ever comes back to work.