\/Fyrefly - Prologue & Chapter One

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\/FYREFLY
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This happens to be a story I'm working on at the moment. It needs some major revisions, I believe, before I continue with it, but this is a start. I'm currently on Chapter Six, so I figured I could post this up a while and see what kind of response I could get out of it.

Please, feel free to criticise! I need it! ^___^

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Prologue: Chapter One

"I thought I was dying. I really thought that if I was to be left alone, with no one who understood, with no one who cared, that I was going to forever drift in my place and die, my soul ripped apart by the fingers of Fate, my heart bespattered by the mischievousness of Destiny; everything I had worked for discarded by the lifeless mind of Hate. I thought that if I stayed put, if I stayed in one place, that no one could ever get me, that I would be safe in the confinements of my own mind. I didn’t realize that I was only hurting myself more . . . I was never safe, for my own mind had locked me into a cell with all three creatures that haunted me so.

"But then... you happened. You came walking down that dusty old road, the sun shining happily in your eyes, and I knew that I was saved. Your sun dried my helpless tears of rage and loneliness, your hands caressed my worn body and soul, and your wings lifted me until I could see the light again.

This is a story of you, this is a story of me, this is a story of the sun, this is a story of everything and everyone in it. There is no beginning, for there is no end. Time is foolish . . . time cannot tell a story. Only the three creatures who haunted me so can tell a story. And this is it. This is their story."

ONE

He brushed the scar on his left cheek lightly with the tips of his fingers. This was an ever reoccurring event, for his fingers somehow found comfort during the process of thinking there. The young man's process of thinking was different from most, for he preferred to think only of the good and not the evil that had spread an ominous cloud over the world. An epoch of dueling beliefs had come since the last time he had set foot outside of his own invisible barriers. His barriers were what kept him out of trouble, in which trouble meant joining in the duel on one of the sides.

This day, you could say his thinking process was slightly off track. The latest developments in the battle between the two beliefs had all recently sent their fingers pointing toward the leaders of such schools as the one the young man sat in right now. Schools meant for good, yes, but it was these schools that ended up being the scapegoats for the war.

These schools taught their students not only in the art of standard school subjects, but in self-defense, offense, and certain other techniques special to each style of school. All things considered, the schools were a way of learning to live and work in the real bustle of the world, and of learning how to deal effectively with the oncoming of a new era filled with impossible things. Why were the schools blamed then, you say? The schools created beings of great destruction, such as the young man, allowing such a war as the Dueling Beliefs to be started. With each new human that carved his path, the requisition to use the arts the schools had taught them became larger until it was no longer just an order, but a desperate order that was filled on the spot.

The young man pulled his hand away from his face and rearranged his body on the uncomfortable bench. He was tall, and it was extremely hard to arrange his body in a way in which everything was in a state of comfort. His mind was restless, which therefore made his own body just as so. His hand jumped toward his face again, but it deprived itself of its want with a superlative order, and pushed it toward his mass of brown hair. Gently, he brushed his fingers through this mass, feeling every stiff strand of hair fall back into place. It all stood very jaggedly on his head as if his head was a mass of brown icicles. Many envied him for this fact, because they needed some type of hairstyling treatment in order to get the look he had.

Finally, he stood with great effort, a sigh escaping through his mouth. His legs seemed to tremble for a moment before he was able to stand full and secure, his back straight and solid, the muscles of his bare lower legs flexing lightly underneath his skin. With resentment of ever beginning the thought he had in his mind, he pushed his hands into his pockets and lowered his gaze to the floor. First by one step, then by another, he began his daily saunter through the school's halls.

The floor was something he had come to memorize in the passing days, months, and years he had spent there. Never had he thought to bring his gaze up from the floor, for reasons unbeknownst to others and to himself. Perhaps, it was an unconscious state of mind in which he thought that by blocking others out of his sight, he would not bring unwanted thoughts upon himself. The young man was very observant, in fact, so observant that he had begun to see things differently than others. It was a large burden to carry, for everything he knew or thought was always challenged by the normal, original thoughts of the others. There was a part inside of him that was still a lonely, forgotten child, always questioning and searching for ways to escape the high escarpment he stood upon. That child had learned to compromise with the new, wiser young man. The wiser young man had grown and gained wisdom which stood strong as a rock wall in his heart and soul, but his mouth had been sewn shut. Talk about his thoughts he would not; open his cage and let fly his emotions he cared not to even try.

He glanced up every now and then, but only at the pearly white walls, probably made of marble. His feet blocked the view of parts of the incredibly shiny tan floor, so he looked at his boots instead. Their dark brown color accented his naturally tan skin well, he thought.
Eyes began to look his way as a smile slowly spread across his handsome face. "What's he smiling about?" they all thought.

The young man, turns out, had noticed his reflection on the floor for the first time. He never boasted about anything, but he did believe he was fairly good-looking. He looked at his baggy black shorts, white lines following each of the seams, even around the pockets. A yellow shirt hugged his upper body, the sleeves hanging loosely until they cut off just below his shoulder. Two black leather strips of leather ran softly over his shoulders, where they crossed in the middle of his chest and in between his shoulder blades, and stopped at the edge of his shirt. He held in a giggle of satisfaction as he looked at his dark brown hair which people so envied him for. Finally, his gaze passed to his own two eyes.

He was surprised to see those two eyes in his reflection looking right back at him, their sparkling blue startling him. The young man's smile slowly faded as he studied his eyes; his feet slowing their momentum until he stopped completely, and only the forces of friction were left to hold him up. His eyes were a bright clear blue on the surface, as if that color was creating a force field against what was deeper. He looked past the clear blue of the wall on the surface and ventured deeper, sufficing the caverns untouched with the light of the outside world. Hands, that of his own, moved toward the churning deep blue that was past the wall. His hands found nothing but a sea of fury and confusion, a mass of clamoring noise that would not stop. First, his ears began to pound, then his head, and then his whole body. Pulsing through his whole body, he felt it; that sea. Through his own blood flew the emotion he despised most: hate.

His hands were the ship now, and he was the only one who could tame the sea. With one more effort he pulled the sails up, begging the wind to push him out of the storm, away from the sea. He clung with cold, white hands to the rope that held up the sails, his whole body trembling with fear. The gods were clapping their hands now, the force of the contact creating a noise that made his eardrums rattle. Lightning came from nowhere, illuminating the dark and swirling blue sky and sea. For a moment, the young man could see a single bright cloud in the middle of the storm. He willed his ship toward it, and there it was...

The young man looked up from the floor for the very first time in all of his seemingly confined, lonely life and noticed the grand appearance of the building in which he lived out his years. This was all somehow new to him, even though he had spent a good amount of his life within the pearly marble walls. His eyes passed over everything with the new-found curiousness of a kitten. He saw the good things, but bad things were there, pictured in the words the walls had heard.
Many who walked by shot curious glances at him, there own minds not willing, neither ready, to comprehend the amazement that struck the young man. The young man was in his own small world, experiencing everything there was to offer, and absorbing the amazing lightness of the air when his head was held high and proud. He breathed softly through his nose, slowing down his heart until he could no longer hear it pumping against his chest. He closed his eyes and leaned against the nearest marble wall, and focusing on his hearing, he zoned in on the steps of the occasional classmate walking by.

The heavy clunking of an exotic, unusual type of shoe broke his concentration. He opened his eyes slowly to see that the wearer had already passed. Pushing himself off of the wall, he shot glances both ways until he found what he was looking for.

(Continued below.)