Chapter Text
"Here we are in Last City, where unlike others tows, doesn't have a hero agency and plans to keep it that way.
"Instead, they have a bounty hunting system, where people who commit crimes are 'red' and volunteer law enforcers are 'green'. This bounty hunting system is the first of its kind, completely unique to other cities with hero agencies.
"I am here live in the city and will be doing a field study of this town and experiencing first hand what kinds of things and people go on in this city, as well as how the city operates.
"Back to you, Noxcrew."
Scott groaned, combing his cyan hair back with his fingers. The wind frizzed it all up, he probably looked like an idiot on live television.
To be fair, it was kind of hard not to when you are an idiot whose job is being on live television.
"I did my hair ALL NICE-" Scott complained. "And this is what it does to me. Not vibing."
Pearl laughed. Her brown and blond hair handing out of her dark blue hoodie. "That's why you go camera man. No one can see how bad you look."
Luckily the Noxcrew had assigned him somewhere with someone relatively agreeable. They were both sort of new to the kind of job they were doing as well, so that was a nice conversation starter.
Scott, while he usually did travel a lot, only stayed places for a short amount of time. Also he usually reported on sports or did, like real estate and house transformations, not forms of law enforcement.
Pearl, apparently, had never been outside her home city before this. She had been a photojournalist there, but was hired by the Noxcrew to stay with Scott for weekly reports on this town.
For six months.
It had been two days, and Scott was already bored.
"What do we have next?" Scott asked. The two walked down the street, looking at the citizens. None of them seemed impressed by the news reporters.
"We want to get an interview with a 'green'. I suppose we just go and ask around?" Pearl suggested. "I'm also hungry, so we can actually ask around a food place."
Scott shrugged and the two searched the streets for a food place, eventually resorting to just asking a group of people.
As they approached, the group backed up apprehensivly. Scott has gotten weird stares because of the nervousness that comes with being a news reporter, but the genuine hostility put him off.
"Hello!" Pearl waved, either not noticing or not caring about the tension in the air. "We were wondering if you knew a good place to get food?"
The group all looked between eachother, not knowing what to make of the two. Which was stupid, just answer the question.
A guy in a green shirt stepped forward, wearing a white headband to push back his blond hair. He squinted at the two.
"There's a pretty all right sandwich shop five blocks down," green shirt nodded behind the news reporters, signifying the direction. "Pretty pricey though."
"One of the owners has charm speak," another guy with a mustache behind him piped up, with a tone of voice as if he was telling stories around a campfire. "The other owner is pretty scary too."
The group broke into murmurs before another guy in a red sweater jumped off the mail box he was sitting on. There was an edge in his eyes, not quite unlike the competitiveness Scott has seen in athletes over the years.
"Stop scaring them," he rolled his eyes. There was something child like about his voice, giddy. "The shop's a good one, the only place in this city to get a decent sandwich. Tell the owners I said hi."
"Said hi from...?" Scott asked, trying to get his name.
Red sweater eyed the microphone Scott was holding at his side. "They'll know who."
Before Scott could ask anymore questions, the mysterious man had turned vack to his group and was loudly talking, to loud for him or Pearl to cut in. The two turned and shrugged at eachother, following the directions green shirt gave them.
Magic Mountain was... a strange place. Even for a rundown city still under construction it had a lot of health code violations, or would if those still existed anymore.
But other than that it seemed nice. There was a chalkboard of the menu, and some relatively decent tape work on the cracked windows. Other than the people dwelling inside, the building looked like it should have been abandoned or torn down years go. Strange for a city that started construction a year or two ago.
Scott and Pearl glanced at eachother before heading in. There were only a few people inside, minus the two what appeared to be employees.
There was a guy waving around a broom like he was an anime villain for starters. He looked rather unimpressive for someone with such gusto, brown hair with a green streak and an old poet shirt. Other than the green, he looked straight out of a Renaissance fair.
The other one at the register looked at least kid of put together. He was wearing a purple hooded cape (and Scott though thee other one was a cosplayer) which seemed to be hiding tufts of white hair. The dude himself however, wasn't old at all, Scott would go as far as to say he looked pretty fit. Over alla pretty friendly looking dude.
... except for the scars everywhere. Yes, he had slashmarks on his face and burns and it kind of look like he was a survivor of an explosion. No one else in the store commented on this.
Scott walked to the counter aprehensivly Pearl behind him. Seeing as most people they had encountered so far didn't like the whole news reporter thing, they had put their equipment in their backpacks.
"One sandwich please," Pearl ordered. Her eyes darted around the room. "What's your name, sir?"
"Scar," the man at the counter said. Seeing the two reporters' reaction, he continued. "Yes, that is a nickname. I'm very clumsy."
Scott raised his eyebrows and crossed his arms. "One sandwich as well... how long have you been living here?"
"Long enough to know you two are new," Scar pressed buttons on the register as Pearl and Scott gave him money. "What brings you here?"
"Looking for 'greens' to interview," Scott explained. "Know any?"
Scar blanked out for a second before smiling. "Joel!"
The man with the broom looked up sneering. "Kinda busy!"
He had been pretending the broom was a sword.
"Isn't your brother in law still green?" Scar shouted across the store.
"Only cuz he got hospitalized before he got red!" Joel scoffed.
"Where's the hospital?" Scott piped in.
"Ten down one over," Joel rolled his eyes. "But if your looking for the 'exciting life of a green', he's not the one to ask."
"And his name?" Pearl asked. Both the reporters were excited to finally have a lead.
"Jimmy. Real downer," Scar cut in, shaking his head. "Prophets will do that. More of an idiot than anything though. Wait till he tells you how he got in the hospital!"
"Do people normally transition from green to red...?" Pearl asked, looking between the two employees. "Like does being green have a pipeline into becoming a criminal?"
Scar and Joel stared at eachother from across the room for five seconds before they burst out laughing. Laughing for a while.
"What was your guys' names?" Scar said, wiping a tear from his eye. Well that seemed like a bit of an over reaction.
"Scott and Pearl...?" Scott looked over to his cameraman, who just shrugged.
"Hate to break it to you," Scar "but everyone in this city is a criminal. The greens are just in denial. And maybe a bit sneakier. Eight dollars for the sandwiches."
They each paid, Scott a bit more confused than before. Not that he wasn't already confused from that other group of people. Oh yeah!
"A guy told us to say hi to one of you?" Scott said.
Scar shook his head. "Classic. Not even coming in himself. Tell him I said hi back, next time you see him."
Being quite honest, Scott had no real scope on how small this city was to the point hed run into the sane guy twice. They turned around to leave before Scar's voice sounded again.
"*Each of you leave a ten dollar tip.*"
Scott twirled back around, grabbing money from his pocket ad quickly as he could and putting it in the tip jar, time was of the essence. Pearl did the sane thing as the two walked out of the store. Scott was glad he completed that task.
Wait...
Scott and Pearl looked at eachother for the fourth time that day.
"Did he just...?" Scott put his hand on his hip, pointing to the door.
Pearl gave a resigned sigh. Completely fair, they weren't getting that money back if that was the owner with charm speak. "Come on, let's go find out whoever this Jimmy is."