Seven Years Ago

The sounds of a shamisen filled the temple and floated out through the open doors and into the mountains. I breathed in easily, held it and breathed out. The twinge in my legs breaking my concentration. I tried to stop myself from reaching down and massaging them but I couldn’t help it, same as I had not been able to stop for the past 3 years since Valkyr had worked his own……

Present Day

I was slowly roused out of a dream that I was being burnt alive but for some reason I was treating it more as an annoyance than death. I slowly came to as I head the sound of someone trying to navigate the minefield of old plates of food and dirty clothes piles that were strewn around the floor of my generously labelled “Office”.

I tried to crack an encrusted eye but it……

Eight Years Ago

Sitting on the laughably called ‘bed’ in my room, it was just a futon on the wooden floor. I thought about what had happened with Valkyr. I was alone in my room again, the faint scent of Valkyr still lingering in the air as if to mock me. My cheeks burning with humiliation and guilt from the tongue lashing I had gotten from whom I considered my closest friend.

At first we had both avoided talking of old times. Too afraid to pick that scab and start the bleeding again. He told me about his modelling jobs, about how……

Present Day

I made my way to the Loaded Run and lurked out the back like a fat kid stealing sweets, sweating and looking forward to the good stuff.

I knew when Tommy got off and was waiting for him. The back door opened into the disturbingly familiar smelling alley, light and noise spilling out hungrily into the night air. Tommy stood there a moment, framed by the light, talking to someone inside. The door snapped shut, the night huffing back into place like a disturbed cat.

As he made his way towards me I spoke softly into the night air, trying to……

Six Years Ago

I had been spending more and more time wandering through the city and away from the temple. Ever since I had gained these new found powers, now that I had become the thing I had hated for so long I struggled to understand where I fit.

I had gained a Super, to become a Prime because I had accepted finally that I was not a copy, that I was my own man. Now I had become an even more perfect replication. Just what did that mean?

No longer afraid to head into the city, I did not care if I……

Six Years Ago

Sensei had cleaned and bandaged the wound as well as he could but Yuudai knew from the the sounds that he made just how bad it was. He was still not sure how he made it back into the hills and the temple, how he found himself banging on the temples front door, of collapsing into his Sensei’s arms.

He lay on his futon, the pain had changed from all consuming to just a spike drilled into his brain. An improvement.

What had he tried to achieve? Why had he done it? Just because he felt a connection to an……