Evreux

  Ch.1

  The awful humming tune of a motorcycle began to get closer to the oasis in the middle of the Sahara desert. It was the middle of summer, but here it was always this hot. The motorcycle had a roof with air conditioning vents from the speedometer, its sandy yellow color made it almost impossible to be seen from afar. The driver stirred in slowly into the oasis until he reached the middle where the lake was, unbuckling himself and tossing the helmet aside revealing his golden hair at neck’s length held in a ponytail. Beads of sweat began to running down his forehead almost instantaneously; he stripped down to his drawls leaving the golden cloth cape and other desert attire in the sun. The driver felt almost in sync with the desert, without any hesitation he jumped into the lake swimming from side to side enjoying the cool water on his sweaty desert worn skin. “Hello!!! HEY!!! Are you there?” a voice from the precise on the motorcycle begins to disrupt the little peace and tranquility the place had. The man jumped out and picked up the call “Kiter here, what’s good?” he replied, “Bastian is two miles away, remembered that if you bring him alive you get an extra fifty-thousand bucks. By the way Roy spotted us a few minutes ago and he is sitting right next to me, he would like to have a word with you,” announced the voice from the precise. Kiter murmurs “After twenty-five years of bounty hunting and escaping him over and over he finally noticed he had to come on his own if he wanted to really find me. Damn him I told him "NO!" 3 years ago in Rome.” Kiter gets dressed angrily and heads towards Bastian’s location. Reaching his destination nearly twenty minutes after he left the oasis Kiter reached a large shack hidden in the desert, it had a gruesome look, said to harbor fugitives, assassins, and even mercenaries. Kiter parked his motorcycle among the others in front of the shack; he took his helmet off but placed over his head the hood from his cape to hide his face until he had sight of his man. Stepping in not trying to make a scene he grabbed everyone’s attention since he was kind of scrawny now and ripped, moving over to the bar he took a look around as if to try to spot Bastian in an instant. The bartender’s voice was hoarse and unfriendly; he told Kiter “How can I help you?” Kiter looked up at him and said “Give me a shot of your best whisky and can you please tell me if you know a man by the name of Bastian?” The bartender froze hearing Bastian’s name but was too slow to hide his reaction and replied “Bastian? No sir. But here is your whisky.” Kiter took the drink in his hand and turned around towards the room full of delinquents, he gazed from side to side trying to make out faces in the poor lighten room. To his right was a man dressed in a dark brown robe with his entire body covered, except his hands and a small portion of his face could be seen. To his left were two men, one dressed in white pants with a black sleeveless shirt and the other with brown cargo pants and a white shirt. The two men to the left seemed to be traveling together while the man to Kiter’s right seemed to be a loner; the billiard section had a few shady characters but none that could be identified as the convict he was looking for. Turning around to ask the bartender for another shot he feels the presence of someone in back of him then physically felt a stern hand on his shoulder, to his surprise it was Bastian in the flesh. “So you’re here to take me back?” Bastian told Kiter, letting him go and stepping back, “Yes sir! Now want to do it the easy way or the hard way?” Kiter responded. Bastian began to walk towards the exit looking back towards Kiter indicating to follow him , Bastian’s brown hair and green eyes came into view and his 5’4 feet tall stocky body could be more visible now thanks to the sun’s rays. He quickly unleashed his armorth which surrounded him with an armadillo’s shell imprinted on his light armor covering his entire body; in his right hand was a whip that resembled the armadillo’s tail. “I don’t want you to get the wrong idea here. All I want is a nice quiet duel. If you win I’ll go quietly if you lose you can’t chase me. What do you think?” Bastian said stretching and getting warm-up. “Fine , if that’s what you want lets have ourselves a duel then,” Kiter responded his armorth changing into its last form , his gryphon scales gleamed in the light, he had been a bounty hunter for some years now and his claws looked sharper than ever. “Are you the gryphon of the desert?” asked Bastian and Kiter responded with nod, “This will be interesting then. Armadillo spin!” cried out Bastian becoming a brown ball moving at a supersonic speed through the sand , he charged at Kiter’s upper body but missed by a few inches since Kiter was able to fly up at the last minute. Kiter didn’t know what to do his opponent seemed had the advantage on the ground, he had to do something to keep up with him but his train of thought was interrupted by Bastian’s whip lashing out at him in the sky scrapping his arm. Kiter began to shot golden beams at the ground in order to cover himself up with the sand but it was no use Bastian’s super speed cleared all the sand far too fast for Kiter to make a surprise attack , Kiter flew a bit higher so that his opponent’s attack wouldn’t reach him. “Solar-eclipse” Kiter says from a top and a black beam began to form itself in front of him heading now towards Bastian’s shell, Kiter predicting that Bastian was going to hide in his shell he mutters “Solar-burst” firing another beam this time in gold that headed out towards Bastian just a few milliseconds after his last attack. Bastian was tossed back like a ball, not peeping out of his shell scared, “Ha! Come on, your supersonic speed can’t take the heat? That is the problem with all you new Armorth wielders, unfortunately power comes with seniority,” stated Kiter appearing behind Bastian and unleashing a Solar-burst attack on him sending him flying into a sand hill just across from where he was. Bastian’s back was scorched by Kiter’s beam and returns back to his normal form , he gets up grunting nearly out of breath from the fight and tells Kiter “Fine. You win,” falling down into the sand.

  * * * * * * *

  Kiter reaches his base a day after leaving Bastian to the authorities and collecting his reward to find Roy sipping hot coffee on his comfy sofa chair made for relaxation. Roy was dressed with khaki cargo shorts, brown boots and his Blonds are dumb: t-shirt on, he didn’t look anything like the typical government official who made policies or made treaties. To Kiter’s amazement Roy still looked the same as the first time he met him when Kiter was appointed 10th grade Elite, his room was plain the walls where metal and his bunk bed stood to one corner of the room, a self-portrait of himself with the his Elite jacket stood on a wall while on the other side of the room was Roy on his sofa chair. “Hello!!! I see you don’t take friendship too well,” stated Roy once he saw Kiter, then he went on to say “It’s been 3 years since I tried to contact you, if you can please hear me out its of a more dire mission than the last,” “Go ahead am listening,” replied Kiter heading towards the bathroom to take a cold bath. Roy trailed behind and came to a stop at the door of the bathroom and shouted over the noise that the shower was making, “You see. I need you to go kill a young girl that is harboring Zepar.” Kiter jumped once he heard the name of the king Seritu killed ages ago, he quickly got out of the shower and asked Roy , “How sure of all this are you?” “Well you see about four years ago the previous mission I was going to send you on was brought up to my attention by Xantu. He is a seven-teen years old who can see into the future and travel back in time as well,” Roy told Kiter taking a seat on the sofa once more. Kiter brought out a chair and sat right in front of Roy and said “Xantu? That name sounds familiar,” “Well he did mentioned to me he had met you before , which sounded a bit strange since you do not stay in one spot for more than a week,” commented Roy.

  “So what do you say? Can you go kill Clair Dames and rid the world once more of Zepar’s evil? Asked Roy to Kiter with a grim look on his face, but Kiter responded “Why can’t you do it? You are stronger than I am,” “It’s simple. Xantu asked for you to do the job. He is quiet fund of you,” Roy said. “Xantu also indicated to tell you not to fall for her,” Roy stated handing over a map to Kiter which held his next destination, “Can I ask you something?” said Roy standing , “Um sure” Kiter responded taking the map into his ha
nds , “What happened to you? Why this style of life?” Roy asked. “You try to ward off evil with your politics, I do it with my bounty hunting. Or maybe it’s just because we live for too long,” Kiter told Roy and walked towards the base’s cafeteria. The base wasn’t that big, it had about seven rooms with bathrooms included in a cafeteria towards the center, it could fly towards any destination it needed to and the place was always quiet due to the low amount of staff in it. The cafeteria had a few tables in the center and the daily meal towards the right, on a table was a small boy eating spaghetti not leaving a clean trace on his face. Kiter moved towards him and said “Nice one! You couldn’t keep us hidden enough until I was finish?” the boy looked up with sad eyes and responded “I’m sorry the thing is that Moto was cooking this awesome spaghetti and I just couldn’t help myself,” the boy pointing at the computer chef , Kiter rubbed the boy’s violet hair and looked into his red eyes for a second remembering when he was young “It’s ok, we’re going to Drash now though.”

  * * * * * * *

  The base hovered over Drash, Florida at an eagle’s altitude. Kiter reached the cockpit to find Alet the small boy with his violet hair in a frenzy and his red eye seemed a bit pink compared to his reddish eyelids from the all-nighters he had pulled researching on the Dame’s family. The youngster raised his head and told Kiter “Yo! I found a picture of her. It seems her mother/father is un-heard off so she was taken by her grandfather when she was nearly born,” he minimized all his data to display Clair’s picture to Kiter. She was in every way flawless, a tan skin as if fitted upon her body to perfection, her eyes a fiery orange, fire red, waist length hair held in a bun , but was loose enough to let the hair cover her shoulders. It seemed she was 18 at the time of the portrait, her white maiden dress so awkward for its time, it was from Kiter’s generation, he thought to himself. The lighting of the image seemed to gloom as if a shadow was sitting behind her planning its escape. Clair was sitting on a high chair with her legs crossed, her hands rested on her lap enwrapped in white gloves. To the chairs contrast which was brown and red cushiness was the wall which was of a royal purple. Kiter blinked once more to capture the essence of her peculiar smile for it seemed she rarely dressed this way, it could be self-evident on how she resembled Alexis. “Hey are you ok?” asked Alet to Kiter, “Hello!! Remember that is your target.” The word ‘Target’ bouncing off the walls of Kiter’s mind like a tennis ball being slammed from side to side. “Wait?....” Kiter pausing and trying to sort out his thoughts, “Search for the DEMON BOOK OF LIGHT., this just got complicated.” “What’s that? Can you at least explain yourself Kite?” said Alet baffled by such a demand from his Armorth Master. Kiter paced around the squared room with his arms crossed and fickle eyes looking out into space, it took him five minute to speak and when he did his voice seemed to quiver at the sight of Clair’s face. “A decade ago before Roy contacted me, I was out in Greece, in a small village called Kalamata, where I came upon a bandit, his Armorth was dark and vicious as if his guardian was plagued by something evil. He had a pentagram on his right wrist, and a black cloak that surrounded his body. The bandit’s name was Jafar, it didn’t take me long to notice that his Armorth was emitting a strong dark force, just like the time when Roy, Cross, Seritu, and I battled against Zepar. I bagged the guy but it left me so astonished I asked around the town. To my liking I found a book called PARASITICAL FORCES, it talked about summoning or picked by demons to empower a person. Of course like Ryu the bandit got taken over by his demon. Although all Flux wield, Armorth which comes from their guardians, these guardians are usually creatures of light or things that are legends in different cultures for example your guardian Oda Nobunaga the blind swordsman and mine, Rotan gryphon of the desert. Flux that go crazy with power or have dark sides clearly get a guardian fit more to their personality, and if they are after power they will usually try to ask a demon for help. The only person so far that was actually born with a demon guardian was Ryu his predecessors could only go insane by the hands of the demon or lose control of their bodies. The book gives instructions on cleansing a person from the dark tints of the demons they’ve contacted; it just might save her life. Get Roy on the screen we must talk with him,” Kiter explained to Alet who was amazed by all of Kiter’s hidden knowledge. The screen displayed an out-going call to Roy which was picked up in three seconds flat; Roy was on his usual t-shirt with a weird open-eye kid. The kid seemed familiar to Kiter; his huge plain white eyes/hair seemed so strange. The image of the kid clicked in his mind and the images from a dream he once had ages ago, a day before Ryu was taken over by Zepar to be exact. In the dream was the kid displaying everything that was yet to happen, Kiter spoke “You must be Xantu.” “Yes, Kiter and we know why you have called. Trust me I’ve seen all possible futures and they all end the same. You know I tried stopping Zepar from coming into power ,no matter how I’ve helped you, there was no way you could have had avoided that battle with Serot always leaving you unable to intercept Ryu and Caleb. I tried solving that age like a puzzle but noting seemed to stop Ryu from being born and becoming Zepar. Thus like now our only advantage would be to kill Clair, that book is not going to save her Kiter,” the owl eyed Xantu spoke making the words crush into Kiter like tidal wave. Kiter began to shake nervously but couldn’t let this little runt tell him what to do, in his heart a powerful strive to save Clair was burning like an eternal flame. “I guess you know the path I will take then, won’t you?” Kiter asked Xantu to receive a nod in response. “Don’t be foolish…” was all that Xantu was able to say before Kiter broke the communication. “Alet scramble all communications with Roy and everyone else,” “But Kiter!” exclaimed Alet understanding the position he was putting them in. Kiter didn’t bulge and his cold hard stare made Alet not question anymore and scramble the communications. “We must grab her tonight, prepare the sleeping gas please,” instructed Kiter to Alet walking out of the cockpit towards his room.

  Ch.2

  A balcony window was open on the pale mansion’s second floor, it’s curtains were of a solid red color which seemed to make the balcony warmer in the dark night. From a few yards away was an intruder bouncing from tree to tree , he did the best he could to blend in with the night for he wore a black shroud and jet black clothing. On his side he only seemed to have a small gun like object and small pack on his back. A black scarf covering his face only leaving his night black eyes out to indulge his surroundings and furthermore the path that he had chosen. The intruder stood on the tallest tree nearest to the pale white hallow mansion , to his amazement the place was empty , no guards stood patrolling . A chill ran down his spine realizing that it might all be a trap , but without any further hesitation jumped over the fence and quickly took out a rope with a hook on its end , and with a flick of the wrist tossed it onto the balcony. The metal made a faint noise once it made contact with the stone , but the intruder knew what was at stake so after giving the rope a hard pull to check if it could support his weight , he began to ascend. It was pitched black and to his amazement there came a siren from the four corners of the place . Darting fast into the room to find a women in a white gown , sitting up on the edge of her bed , her hard glance seemed to make a whole in the intruder’s skull. “Why are you here?” the women simply asked , for she was still trying to shake the sleep from her body , the intruder moved a bit fast towards the maiden and grabbed her as gently as he could. His left ear began to rang after he received a hard slap from the maiden , “I’m sorry but we have no time!” he told her , a bit irritated by her course of action. The gun like object was already in his hand and he used his super speed to move behind the maiden and make her take a breath of the sleeping gas the object retained. No more than mere seconds later, she was fast asleep on the intruder’s arms , he tossed her hair back and began to trace a finger through her face admiring such youthful beauty. This had gotten even more dangerous the intruder felt, it had only been ten minutes since the sirens were set of
and he felt the rushing of feet on the mansion’s stairs , he quickly took out a folded black bag and covered the maiden with it all the way to her feet and placed her over his shoulder. The door burst open and their came a shout “Stop right there!” , a spiked hair man enshrouded in black armor stood in the door way, his eyes red as blood and of a normal stature. The man was strong for he held a fighter’s stance , he dashed towards the intruder as best he could , but at mid-way he had to change course since golden beams came his way. At last , the man was at arm's length of his damsel in distress , the intruder unleashed a more powerful attack and he was forced back and blinded by such light . “Damn it!” he grunted for in that split second the intruder had escaped with Clair.