I’d never gone skydiving before. It was something I’d wanted to try at least once in my life. The idea of going up thousands of feet and jumping out of a plane was fairly exciting, if more than a bit scary. However, getting sucked into a portal and being spat out in midair was not the way I wanted to do it.

I think I was going at terminal velocity as that notion went through my head, and I had no parachute or other way to slow down. What looked like an impending doom was coming up at me as the events of the day flashed before my eyes.

“Hey, Isaac, wake up!” A familiar voice said from above me. The person in question was Miranda, one of four female friends I was with for an RTX convention. They were cosplaying, I was along for the fun, and we all liked one show in particular: RWBY.

“Gimme five more minutes, Miranda” I said from my spot on the hotel room floor between a bed and the wall. I had opted to sleep there and let the ladies have the beds. I may have also been politely asked and outvoted as well.

“No, Isaac. We’re all dressed and ready to go. Sandra even brought you breakfast.”

“You make a good argument there. Is there another reason I shouldn’t get five more minutes?”

“Ruby? If you’d please.”

I felt something hook onto the back of my shirt collar and pull backwards, pulling my head away from the pillow and floor. It was a replica of Ruby Rose’s scythe, and the person holding it just so happened to be named Ruby as well.

Pulling me up like that got me started on the path to being awake, but what really got me awake was the bit of cold metal along the flat of the blade, which had always perplexed me as to why it was there.

“Alright, alright! I’m up” I said, now standing up and holding a hand to the back of my chilled neck. “Why did you even put that strip of metal there, Ruby?”

“Oh, it was just laying around, I was having difficulty with that side of the blade, and I just put it there” Ruby said. I was no longer perplexed by its presence. Again.

“Right” I turned around and saw Ruby, Miranda, Ally, and Sandra there, dressed up as Ruby, Weiss, Blake, and Yang respectively from RWBY. One thing that still amazed us all was how they each seemed to have the right shapes and sizes for who they were cosplaying as.

Sandra did not hesitate to put a plate of food and a fork into my hands. “Let’s be out of here and on the road in 20 minutes. Eat fast, Isaac, and get everything you’ll need. Go go go!”

I didn’t hesitate to quickly eat the hotel breakfast, and was done in a couple minutes. After taking care of the last things I needed to, and with 5 minutes to spare, we piled into my fairly spacious car. It was the kind of car that didn’t look like it had a big interior, but actually did once you got in. Ally once said it was like having a party in a time traveling phone booth. That was a few years prior and I still had no idea what she meant.

The drive to the convention center went fairly smoothly. I drove, and the girls chatted. I liked to keep as much of my focus on the road, so I rarely joined in any conversations, and as a result, I was one of the better drivers amongst my friends and acquaintances.

We showed up at the convention center fairly early, and so we managed to snag a good parking spot close to the building. A good thing too, since we were in Texas in summer and it was already heating up, even though it wasn’t even close to 10 AM.

We grabbed all our things from the car, myself with a plain black messenger bag and my friends putting their wallets and such in it. I also put my keys, wallet, and phone in it. All five of us had a designated section for our own things, saving the main section for things we bought. Coincidentally, the five sections for our personal items, going by the first letters of our names, spelled IMARS. It sounded like something Apple would sell on a galactic or godly scale.

After being permitted inside, we found ourselves in a wide open area, with people already set up to sell stuff at various booths. We went to the nearest one, which did not have any RWBY things for sale. RWBY was the only thing we really cared about for the trip, so we systematically went from booth to booth, doing quick scans for RWBY stuff, the girls buying almost anything that caught their eye. Initially, we stuck with prints, which we would have framed later. We did find one person selling very detailed sculptures in action poses. The girls wound up buying 2 each, resulting in us having all of teams RWBY and JNPR. This resulted in my messenger bag having almost no room left and weighing heavily on my shoulder, though that may have also been due to my lack of muscle.

We found a few more small prints, which I wound up buying, much to nobody’s displeasure. The prices were reasonable and the pictures were awesome.

Just when we thought we were done, we saw one last booth we hadn’t checked. Sitting in the booth was a man in a tan jacket, and behind him was a pile of deerskin briefcases, all neatly lined up on various shelves. It looked like there were more of the briefcases than should have been able to fit in the limited space of the booth, but none seemed to be too tight between its neighbors.

“Hello, there” the man said. His voice was strange. It was a voice that somehow lacked any kind of sound, but the words spoken remained like a slowly dimming afterglow in the mind. “Those are some excellent cosplays, and I believe I have something for the one dressed as Yang Xiao Long that she would really like.”

Our collective curiosities were piqued, as well as our apprehension, and so we warily made our way over to him. About five feet from the booth, a sudden and eerie silence overtook us, as all sound from the rest of the convention seemed to vanish, or at least just become very muted.

Sandra approached the man first. “What do you have that I would like, Mr. . .”

“Merchant” the man spoke in his non-voice before turning around and picking out a particular deerskin briefcase, setting it on the table, and opening it. “These are the-”

“Ember Celica, yes, I know. I have my own on.-” Hers were built in gauntlet mode.”-What makes these so special?”

The man pulled one out, revealing an attached fingerless glove. When he pinched part of the glove, the weapon replica went from full gauntlet to bracelet in less than three seconds. All of us were stunned at that action.

“I see you’re impressed. However, I’m not done yet” the man not-said, before setting the gauntlet on the table. In the briefcase was a small silver case, and he opened it, revealing two sets of six different colors of shells.

“Yang only has two kinds of shells. Why are there six here?” I asked him.

“I may have gone overboard when designing this replica” he explained. “These prop shells can fit in the Ember Celica. Please watch.” The man slid back the cover of the other Ember Celica, and effortlessly loaded a band of orange shells into it. A few seconds after closing the cover, he opened it again and pulled the shells out with ease. “I will sell you these Ember Celica and the case of shells for $50.”

Sandra’s jaw dropped the furthest of us. It was a very good deal. She was also the first to recover and started figuring stuff out, probably some numbers, since she seemed to have an air calculator in front of her. She then turned to me. “Isaac, would you be so kind as to buy these for me? I don’t have enough in my budget for them.”

I sighed. “I guess I could. Where would I carry them though? My bag is full.”

“Why, you could just wear them. And the case with the shells has a strap on it, so you can carry it like your bag. Maybe it’ll even balance out the bag if you have it on the opposite side.” Sandra had some very good points.

“Oh, alright. But you’ll have to hold my bag while I put them on because my shoulder needs a break.”

“Fair enough” Sandra said as she easily accepted the messenger bag. I pulled out some cash from my wallet, put it back in the bag, and paid the $50 for the Ember Celica. Even though nothing about the man’s face or body language changed, I seemed to be getting a negative vibe off of him. I put the case with the shells in it across my body in the opposite direction I carried my messenger bag. I figured out the spot on the Ember Celica’s gloves that changed their modes and put them in their bracelet mode before putting them on.

“I actually kind of like these” I said before striking some fun poses. They were surprisingly light and not at all uncomfortable. Sandra set my bag on the ground before getting in on the action, raising her fists in a playful manner. I pressed my fingers against the base of my palms, making them change form. I hadn’t had my fists up to match Sandra’s for more than a few seconds when everything I saw was lit up with a blue light and I felt a force pulling me backwards, getting faster and faster, and in less than ten seconds, I was sucked in and found myself in a white void.

I wasn’t sure if I was floating, moving at high speed, or something between them, nor was I sure how long I was there. I just knew I couldn’t really move, was bored, and concerned for my friends. I did take small comfort in the fact that they had my keys, and could get home.

At some point, I lost all feeling in my body, then it came back. I felt a pulling sensation, and figured I was heading for another portal. Before I got there, I felt my brain itch for a moment. That’s the best way to describe the sensation anyways. Shortly after the sensation ceased, I was fully pulled through the portal and spat out into the air.

After I looked back on the events, I looked down and saw that I was not going to hit the grass covered ground, or at least what looked like it. No, I was falling towards what looked like a colossal crystalline castle. Before impact, I put my arms up in front of me, half-noticing the extended Ember Celica on them.

I crashed through the roof and a floor before landing on another floor, a crater showing my landing site. I was slightly sore, and started to stand up. I had almost fully stood up when something crashed into my head and sent me back to the floor, my head making a new crater. My vision was kind of blurry, and just before I lost consciousness, I saw two purple blurs come my way, one taller and with a few light stripes higher up on it, the other shorter and with green throughout it. I couldn’t make out what they were saying, but the shorter one was told something and left. I let myself slip into the world of blissful unconsciousness as the bigger one came closer.

Author's Notes:

So I started writing this some time ago, and I felt that now was a good time to post it. 5 Internets to whoever can figure out why I chose now.

Also, this is, if you somehow haven't guessed, a Displaced fic. If you are new to this kind of story, go look around. There are some good ones out there, and I fully intend for this to be one of those good ones.

Comments are appreciated because I like seeing a number up by the bell.