The Rising Sun: Episode 1 by J Hawk Page A

CRIMINAL, AND MUST BE KEPT AWAY
    FROM IF
SPOTTED ANYWHERE, AT ANY COSTS.
     
    Issued by the
interstate crime department, 42972
     
     
    Series of
murders…
     
    The lunatic
stared out of the poster with his horrible red eyes. The crease of
an evil smile lay tilted over his face. His black hair was wild and
unkempt. The twisted look of his face suddenly seemed to breathe
life to his features…
     
    Ion felt a
visceral surge of fury and hatred like nothing else his entire
life.
     
    He bore
enmities from his past. Grando. Vonayz. Plenty others … But none of
them matched the rage he felt at the sight of that face in the
poster. That face which he had dreaded and hated for so long. Which
had haunted him for so long … and which always would.
     
    As the heavy
feeling passed, he felt his mind drift to a far more peaceful
region of memories … memories of his master, Jedius.
     
    The past is
dead, only if you let it be. Jedius’s words echoed at the back
of his head, seeming to carry across a wide chasm. Do not dwell
on it and keep it alive, Ion. Give yourself the opportunity to move
to a better present, and to craft it into a better future.
     
    With one final
glance at the dreadful poster, Ion crumpled it and stuffed it back
into his pocket. He let his back slide over the thick tree trunk
behind him, and gazed up at the stars above. The night’s blissful
aura subdued the grief and regret that had just re awakened within
him. He lay slumped against the tree, staring at the beauty of the
scenery around him, able to lose himself at last.
     
     
    Two years
ago
     
     
    Ion was
falling. A giant, fifty meter fall. He felt himself twist about in
mid air to catch view of the cliff above him, shrinking in his
vision as he plummeted. The cliff he had fallen from…
     
    He spun about
in mid air, whizzing like an arrow towards the ground. His fall
rapidly gained speed and momentum. His heart seemed to have jammed
in his chest, and the sensation of wildly accelerating freefall
hollowed his insides out.
     
    He saw the
rough brown ground zoom upwards, waiting to engulf him.
     
    And then … a
sickening, loud crash that echoed across the place.
     
    The impact of
the fall, that left a web of cracks over the ground, would have
killed anyone else on the spot. But Ion withstood it without dying
for the fact that he was a mystic … unfortunately.
     
    He would have
screamed, if not for the fact that all breath had been scoured from
his lungs, and he gasped in helpless, slight hisses to re gather
it. The fall had definitely broken a fraction of the non vital
bones in his body.
     
    It was pain
beyond pain. Excruciating. It seemed to split him from head to
toe.
     
    He would lie
here, helpless, in the middle of a deserted, uninhabited region and
watch himself die slowly and painfully … He could feel the life
slipping from his veins. But he knew that he would endure an hour
or so before he would finally die … and every second that passed
seemed to last for a century.
     
    Ion was facing
hell itself.
     
    All sensations
had ceased, except for the mindless, throbbing pain all over. Ion
couldn’t move. Couldn’t twitch a nerve. He couldn’t blink without
leaving his eyes streaming…
     
    He was all
alone in this lifeless region, with no one to even cling his hopes
to … He had never imagined that this would be his way of
exiting…
     
    He felt himself
drift … floating between consciousness and unconsciousness. It
sharpened the pain cracking open his body ten fold. And Ion yearned
for it to stop. The world seemed to flicker on and off, and lights
popped up over the back of his closed eyelids.
     
    And suddenly,
the swishing of cloaks shrouded what remained of his vision. He
thought he was surrounded by someone … or some people. And before
he knew it, as his consciousness slipped, he was being hoisted
upwards painfully. And he was then gliding … flying … or was he
dreaming? The sensation of leaving the ground and