Saint Tesara...

Yes, the city of Saint Tesara WAS a bustling one, like a tropical New York. Brightly lit skyscrapers outshone the stars and blocked the low-hanging Moon, and the wind and the sounds of nature were obstructed by the deafening cacophany of car horns, footsteps, and voices in the streets.

But on the outskirts of the city, near where the Brunson River emptied into the ocean, things couldn't be more different... The residual light of the city illuminated an otherwise-dark shoreline like the Sun itself. The running water saw almost no human life most days, and was instead populated by fish and the creatures that lived off of them. Various wading birds, deer, and even the occasional bear weren't uncommon sights.

It was a place of tranquility... The place that he called home.

He stalked silently through the shallower end of the river, his feet bare and his pants rolled up above his knees. His eyes darted around wildly, methodically, watching for any sign of movement in the water. In one hand, held over his head, was a wooden stick with some sort of metallic barb tied to the end. In his other hand, slung around his shoulder, was an empty 5-gallon bucket.

'Steady...' he thought, being as still as he could be.

After a few moments, a small fish further upstream neared one of his legs.

KA-SPLASH!

The barbed staff came down like a guillotine, skewering the fish through the back. Its catcher finally allowed himself a deep breath as he raised his prize from the water and inspected it. Decent size, clear eyes, brightly-colored gills... Dinner was served.

The unorthodox fisher removed the fish from his makeshift spear, but a sudden burst of light overhead suddenly diverted his attention from his meal. He looked up, eyes wide, as something bluish-white in color streaked through the sky overhead.

'A comet...?' he thought. 'I've not heard anything in the media about-'

PLISH!

The fish wriggling from his hand and falling back into the river snapped the man from his thoughts. He looked down for the creature, attempting to recatch it, but it was already gone. His stomach let out an unhappy growl.

"Damn it...!" he hissed, glaring back up at the fading glow in the sky.

'........van........ Ivan...........'

Someone calling his name was enough to snap the man - Ivan Fostovok - out of his annoyance and look around himself. He tossed his empty bucket aside and leveled his fishing tool like a weapon.

"Who is that?" Ivan demanded, his hunger immediately vanishing from his mind. "Who called me?"

He was met with silence. The voice didn't reply, even after further instruction for an answer. Every noise for several more minutes - a stick falling into the river, a frog croaking, Ivan's bucket rolling along the bank - got a spear pointed at it, but Ivan's name was not called again. He finally let himself lower his walking stick.

'Police, perhaps...' he thought, recalling a few days earlier when he'd been nearly arrested for bathing himself in what he now knew was a duck pond. That was why he was foraging out in the boonies for food again, for the time being.

In all truth, something in his gut told Ivan that it wasn't the police after him again, but despite Ivan wanting to mull it over a bit more, said gut let out another, louder rumble, driving home his previous point. His mood even worse than it had been before, Ivan sat on a rock and dried his feet, then put his boots back on and began to hike further up the river in search of another meal.


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