Straight To the Core (a portal au)

Chapter: 1 "One man's trash is... ALIVE?!"

It had started to lightly rain as the group got out of the parked car, plastic bags in hand as the Harajuku god himself walked in front of them. Holding a new, ten-year-old kid with anger issues, his nephew by the child harness leash his mother gave him to make sure he wouldn't run off or break anything. The ten-year-old, AJ, wore an oversized red hoodie, accompanied by large basketball shorts that he had stolen from Dan a while back, arms crossed, clearly grumpy about the whole harness thing. "Alright, gang before we split up, a few ground rules, since I'm sure your parents want you all to be as safe as possible, make sure you listen." began Niki. "First off, don't wander too far away without telling me, I want to keep a close eye on you lot to make sure you don't get hurt. Secondly, if you see something in a dangerous section, tell me, I will get it for you. Finally, don't touch any animal, or plant, in case it's poisonous or harmful." he warned sternly, looking at the group for confirmation and questions. Getting a nod from all but Alistor, who had lost a fight digesting the cookies he had eaten and was currently upchucking behind a bush. Shaking his head, the rainbow covered man pointed to the sick child, "this is why you listen to my rules." he said, making Alistor an example before heading over to check if the twelve-year-old was alright, temporarily handing over his nephew to Kevin. "Be careful, and don't stray too far away, alright?" the rainbow clad man requested once more, getting nods from all the non-sugar sick kids before they dispersed to look for things they could use for their projects.

As they searched, they found a few small things, metal scraps from old machines, which Kiara took some of for future personal projects, an old box of LED lights, a pack popsicle sticks, and a few other small objects, but nothing too significant. "Ugh, this is so boring," AJ muttered, sitting next to his uncle, who he had been handed back also after Alistor had finished tossing his cookies, "Can we just go home already!" to which Kevin looked at him from over his shoulder. "Nope, we have to find at least something to use as a base. Otherwise, the rest of this stuff would be considered useless." Kevin reasoned logically, causing the younger child to cross his arms and grumble something about wanting to play video games. Kiara, however, giggled at the little boy's pouty face, Dan had mentioned that he didn't care much for his cousin, but she hadn't minded the younger boy very much, AJ wasn't that bad when you look past his angry facade. Suddenly, a blue light caught Kiara's eye, coming from underneath a small mound of scrap metal, which she gently moved out of the way to reveal a round object with handles and a screen showing a cracked bit of glass, with a blue screen. The object was a bit dented, with chipped factory paint and a faded logo that read Aperture. "Hey, guys, come look at this!" she called out, getting her teammate's attention as they one by one headed over to her to see what she had found. "Check this out, cute little thing, with a few adjustments and rewiring, could make a pretty cool lamp," she suggested to her group, getting a few nods when suddenly. "Hey, hey! I may not exactly have limbs to fend you off any. Still, I refuse to be gutted and turned into a dim house ornament!" the sphere spoke, causing the preteen holding it to drop it and hide behind her brother immediately. "IT'S POSSESSED, OH GOD!" she screamed as the metal sphere groaned as the shock of hitting the ground passed through its pain receptors. "Kiara, it's not possessed its sentient." Kevin sighed, looking over his shoulder to look at his sister. " Are you sure?" she asked in return, earning a very unamused look from her twin as Dan's father walked next to the children, with little AJ in tow. "Hmmm, Kevin is right. It probably still has power," Niki remarked "even so, it still has emotions. We shouldn't just leave it here." Niki went to pick up the metal ball when more glowing eyes opened to look at them. The rainbow clad man stepped back from the group of metal orbs when one of them snagged his attention. The metal shell orb was splattered with colorful, vibrant paint, its eye an equally as vibrant rainbow gradient. Niki seemed to have caught the metal sphere's attention as well, as it looked him up and down as its bottom 'eyelid' popped up, sort of like a smile, "I love you hair," it exclaimed, in a robotic, model-like voice. Niki chuckled a "thank you" in response.