The Future Will Change

After their first set of classes for the day, both Keiji and Rumble met up at a cafe near the university where students were allowed to get lunch from. The big city environment of Vanhoover was much different from Canterlot City due to the extreme population difference. For reference, the recorded population of Canterlot City was about 500,000 compared to Vanhoover’s massive 2 million.

There was also a general lack of natural spaces with a heavy emphasis on urbamized buildings almost everywhere one looked. The closest equivalent would be something akin to Manehattan with the sheer density of high rises and skyscrapers that littered the main areas with the suburbs only taking up a small portion of it.

The boys met up at a cafe that required them to walk up a flight of stairs that rested above a small stationary store.

“Damn, this place is much different than the sticks,” Keiji commented as he and Rumble took a seat at one of the tables. It was a rather retro-meets-modern style cafe with tile floors, a jukebox in the corner, and various Vanhoover-related memorabilia such as flags and jerseys on the walls.

“You can say that again,” Rumble replied. “Everything is so cramped up in this big city that I find it hard to breathe sometimes. But at least we have different stores to shop at for a change, right?”

“...yeah, I don’t know a thing about shopping,” Keiji admitted. Even now, the vampboy had still been used to ordering everything online.

Something Rumble lamented. “...my dude, we need to show you how to hit up a store.”

Keiji’s mind was already elsewhere though. “...right. So uh, what do you think about that Vertex guy?”

“I dunno,” Rumble replied as he thought back to their leader of House Iota. “He didn’t seem like a bad guy. Maybe we just caught him at a bad time?”

“I’m just confused as to why a girl would be at the frat house if they aren’t allowed there,” Keiji continued.”

“Maybe she got lost?”

“That’s likely, Rumble. Maybe. He probably wanted to scare her off or something.”

Rumble sighed as he looked out of the window to the city, “Still kinda crappy how he treated her though.”

“I can’t blame him though. Loads of incidents have happened over the last year where magical beings have done some awful shit,” Keiji explained as he recounted events that had occurred while glancing at his phone, “Let’s see…yeah, there was an incident where some guy got magnetic powers and used them to fling people’s cars everywhere. Around 30 people were killed…”

Rumble’s eyes shot open and he bit his lip. “...yikes. I didn’t realize. But that’s just one, right?”

“...nah, bud. There’s been far more incidents other than that. There was this one chick who managed to harness the power of plants and suffocated a bunch of people under them,” Keiji continued as he looked through the public crime database, “Some dude who had werewolf powers and went on a killing spree, and some other chick who stole guys’ souls through…her body, let’s say and robbed them blind.” Then he showed his phone’s screen to Rumble which displayed the numbers. “From those incidents alone, around 500 people died--including children--and millions of dollars in property damage was inflicted around the surrounding cities. It’s gotten to the point where they each have designations.”

“...Designations?”

Keiji nodded, “Threat Levels. Class D threats are the lowest and Class S threats are the highest. The magnetism guy and plant chick were both Class A for instance.”

Rumble absorbed himself in all the information that Keiji had just told him. Magical beings were now being given threat levels to specify just how deadly they were when the police had to approach them. This in turn, made it so that other ‘mutant’ folk like Keiji--who was once a vampire batpony--had to live in secret.

“...I get it now,” he replied, “Shit like this makes it harder for everyone that isn’t a normal human. But I can’t blame them for getting scared. It’s in our nature to fear things that encroach upon, and threaten us.”

“It is what it is,” Keiji sighed as he put his phone away and sat back against the seat of his booth, “Thankfully, I don’t have any particular mutations that make me stand out. But going back to Vertex, I’m just hoping we can show him that we’re not out to hurt him.”

Rumble blinked, then remembered that he had inherited a small amount of power from Equestrian magic. Sci-Twi had dubbed it-- “Aether. That’s right. I guess that’d make you a pureblood Etherian while I just kinda got some of it.”

“...yeah we are not calling it that,” Keiji muttered in an annoyed tone, “Just stick to something simple like ‘mutant’, yeah?”

“Fair enough. So do you think we can show Vertex that we’re not evil mutants?”

“Yeah I think so,” Keiji replied, then chuckled as he reflected on his past self, “Heh. The younger me probably would’ve just challenged him and escalated the situation before getting us all in trouble.”

“And I probably would’ve joined in because I was irresponsible like that,” Rumble agreed, “But for Scootaloo’s sake, I don’t think I’ve got it in me to do that anymore.”

“Glad to hear you both are doing alright,” Keiji replied with a smile as a waitress walked up to them. The first thing she noticed was Keiji’s letterman jacket.

“Hello, boys--oh, I see that you’re students, hm?” the older woman in uniform asked, “Please be sure to head straight back to your dorms right after, okay? We’ve been getting reports of college students getting attacked by mutated individuals lately.”

Rumble had looked down at the menu, but his head shot up when she mentioned attacks. “W-wait, what?

The waitress would continue with a sigh, “Yes…unfortunately we’ve been hearing it quite often around here in Vanhoover. The police are trying to do what they can to keep everyone safe, but to be extra careful, just make sure you get home before it gets dark. That’s when the mutants are supposedly out and about.”

“...I see…” Keiji replied apprehensively as he tucked his overbite within his lips to keep the waitress from seeing his vampony teeth.

“Anyway, what would you boys like today?”

One meal later, and the two of them were on their way back to their dorms on campus…

But along the wait, that same hooded figure with cat ears started to follow them from the shadows. But she also had a tail too?

"There they are. I got ye knob'eads now."