The city is a nice quiet place for him and his mom. It's modern and friendly and a blend of enough diversity and kindness. He hasn't been well about making friends. He doesn't mind. He thinks he'll wait until school starts. But he likes the city so far. It's not so crowded, but there are always people. It's a smaller city than he expects, so a lot of the places, like parks and stores, just remain closely bound together.

Thankfully, his mom is letting him go into this unknown alone. Using her medical degree, she had earned a rightful place in the Panorama Central Hospital. It makes fairly a good amount of money to keep a guaranteed assurance for their rental payment, so they're both satisfied. So while his mother works shifts during the summer, he chooses not to remain alone stuck inside the house alone. A lot of the days follow the routine: mom leaves, unpack a little, call mom to let her know, go outside to explore the city.

So he walks around lazily looking for nothing in particular. Once in a while, he uses an allowance to get an ice cream or something, but he's just exploring, merely going around in circles to get known of this world.

There's one day where he sees something new. He's walking right into the heart of town when he sees an innocent female face walking towards his direction, looking down and then around. She has bright golden girls shielding her face and she's hugging her yellow cardigan around her petite framed body. She's slung a white backpack around her back, which seems to catch Troy's eye pretty quickly. But even from a distance, he can see that she's walking quite quickly, seemingly trying to find her way.

When the two of them are closer together, somewhat under ten yards, it seems like out of nowhere there is a group of older, bigger kids that come near her. One unexpectedly brings their leg out, and the small blonde girl immediately falls, with a small item flying out of her hands. Troy wants to think that it was an accident, before he sees those people laughing and staring at her for a second before turning around in a choir of snickers.

It's all too familiar. That feeling, that same pain that drew into his heart for so many years had come back in an aching sympathy for the stranger that had been torn down. He remembers how it used to be for him, been blown like that every day, being knocked down as if it was oh-so casual. It hurt.

Troy blinks before rushing over there himself. He's quick enough to arrive in a closer vicinity of both the girl and the bullies, and he doesn't back out to call to them.

"You can't just do that! That's rude!"

They hear him once, and turn around and stare directly to him. They look almost…disgusted, and insulted that he would actually be telling them off.

"Why do we take orders from a tiny little stranger like you…or her? Leave us alone, moron." one of them speaks up. Troy has the urge to rant more, but they swiftly turn around and walk away for both of them.

He kneels down to the small girl who is staring at the bullies walking away, then shaking her head.

"Let me help you." he says softly. He supports her as she sits up properly. She finally makes eye contact with him, and Troy sees it in her small, timid hazel eyes. The fear, the pain, the casualty. He realizes just by how her eyes speak that this girl could simply be just like him, feeling that all this is normal.

"You didn't need to do that." she says to him. She brushes herself off a bit and then adds, "I was okay."

Troy shrugged his shoulders. "It wasn't okay to me. That was for no reason, and it sickens me to see that stuff happen to anyone." he tells her. "Do you know them?"

She shakes her head. "I actually just arrived in town. Literally."

"Cool. I came here a few weeks ago, so welcome."

She lets out a small giggle, and proceeds to brush herself off. Troy realizes that she's holding a small thin wooden cylinder tightly in her hands, and in the moment where she stuffs it in her bag, he sees that it's a small flute. He is soon finding himself turning with scouring eyes that land in the area behind him. He turns and reaches out to what she had dropped, and then held out his hand for her to take it.

"I think this is yours." he says. He's holding a small plastic triangle item, shining bright yellow and black with a Japanese Kanji symbol encrusted on it. He watches as her eyes widen slightly and she abruptly takes it from his hands, mumbling a slight thank you before it's hanging around her neck.

Troy takes this time to stand up and brush himself off a bit as well. He soon holds his hand out to the lady below him, and she gently takes it as he helps her up.

"Well, thank you…" she said, then faded into a pause staring at him, and he realizes that she's looking for him.

"Troy. I'm Troy."

She smiles and nods to him. "Troy. Nice to meet you." she says.

"Yeah, you too." he replied with a polite smile as well. He stops himself for a moment, but then continues and adds, "Hey, do you need helping finding your way? You seemed kind of lost when I saw you."

She seems surprised, most likely because he had noticed her before. He thought that she was going to reply a simple no, but he was relived at her true answer.

"Actually, yes. That'd be great. Thank you." she said.

Troy nods, and tells her "Of course. Where are you headed?"

"The town center."

"Oh, that's back there. I just passed. I'll lead you."

"Thank you, Troy."

And she's at his side, and he's turned the other way again. He finds himself walking side by side with this girl as they begin finding her way in a comfortable friendly silence.

~X~

"You've been bullied too?"

Troy and the girl have found themselves talking to complete strangers about their past and present. Troy's predictions had been right. She had shared a similar story. This stranger had been bullied just like him. They had shared painful memories too. Coincidentally, they both would come home crying as well.

It was one of the only times where Troy had felt comforted by another person in his presence, beside his family. She hadn't been manipulating, rude, or disrespectful. She was innocent, kind-hearted, and pure. It let him feel warm inside too. They would share genuine smiles, friendly laughs, and kind gestures. In that time, he had been thankful for her coming into his view.

"Pretty much as long as I can remember." he replies to her. "No one really liked me as a kid. I don't they think they like me now."

"Same here. I really couldn't do anything right. That had been the perfect opportunities for bullies." she says.

"It hurts, doesn't it?"

"Yes, Troy. It does." she sighs.

They're walking down a slight hill of a road when she slows down a little bit. Her eyes become fixed on the area in front of her. Troy sees that they've arrived to the center of town, so he follows her gaze. She's looking at two people next to a van, with an Asian woman in gray with a dash of pink and an African American man in a blue sports jacket with a blue swim cap and goggles hugging his head.

Her eyes perk up and she gives off a small grin. She looks to Troy, and he meets his gaze.

"That's my stop." she tells him.

Troy nods, a little disappointed that his time with her had to end so quickly. But he was with her for one reason, and now she had to go. So he nods, and asks "You know them?"

"I'm about to." she replies with a deep breath and another smile. She looks back to him with the same smile, her eyes warm and friendly. "Thank you," she says to him. "For everything you did for me, calling out the bullies, helping me up, leading me here. It really means a lot."

Troy grins, and nods. "No problem. And thank you. You defiantly put some warmth into my heart for today." he tells her.

Her smile just about grows bigger. "Really?"

"Really." he answers confidently. He had just poured himself out to a complete stranger, and it had felt good today.

He thinks she can feel it too, because unexpectedly, she reaches up and wraps her small arms around him. But Troy doesn't mind. He doesn't mind at all, and hugs her back softly. When they release, Troy knows that she has to go now, and he has to fall back a little lonelier.

"Thank you, again. Goodbye Troy." she says gently. And she begins to walk away from him, down the hill, when Troy has to stop her again.

"Do you think I can see you again?" he calls down to her.

She stops and turns to him. She gives a comforting smile, and says with full honesty, "I'm sure that you'll see me around here. I don't think I'll be going anywhere for a while." Then she continues her path down to the two people when Troy pauses her once more.

"Wait, what's your name?" he calls quickly. She turns again, farther away from him now.

"I'm Emily."

Then, she's quickly bouncing down the road, and she's parted away from her.

"Emily…" he mumbles off his tongue. He smiles, and says to himself:

My first friend's name is Emily.

He can't help but watch her as she talks to both of the people down there, when they are soon joined by another person. He looks more Emily's age, and he's sporting the color green.

He looks at them for a second before suddenly clutching his head.

~X~

A mutant creature stands at the heart of town, thrashing attacks and hits to all the common civilians roaming the city, but now trying to evade the area.

"That's right. Come on down!" he taunts at a losing human toppling down the stairs.

"That's enough!" a voice booms above him.

As the evasion by humans continues, there are five civilians that come up into view. With matching outfits with a different colored trim for all, they stand bravely at the top of the stairs. They're looking dead in the eyes of their opponent.

"Well it's about time. Aww, come on. Who are you punks?" he boasts at them.

"We're the Samurai Rangers." the voice in the middle calls. A device is flipped out in his hand, and he leads his group of five in a heroic chant.

"Samuraizer!" he yells. And the whole pack is mimicking the same motion.

"Go Go Samurai!"

In the blink of an eye, each of them are drawing colored symbol, which soon fall onto their own bodies and morph into a head-to-toe body suit. Each has a helmet with their symbol on it and their own sword, they become prepared for battle.

"Rangers together, Samurai forever!

~X~

Troy is taking deep and rough breaths, jolting himself to process what had just played itself in his mind. He releases his head, and gently stands up straight. He is instantly looking straight at the crowd down with Emily.

He believes he just had a vision.

And he swore that in that vision, that he heard Emily too.

He gulps, but slowly turns around and away from Emily and her new friends. His pace quickly speeds up, and his view of the four in the town center is fading as he goes farther up the inclined road. He turns to see them one more time, and sucks in a breath as he continues walking into the city.

But not before he gets a view of the man in red riding up to them on a white horse.