Michael had awoken in a small cottage type house, wooden floors, wooden ceilings and minimal non-wooden furniture confirmed it for him
He was most likely in some sort of village since the air for one was not like Retere, where the pollution levels had kept him on edge all the time there.
Sometimes he wished that Kallen would try to fight to outlaw the greedy S.S council members from spreading all the pollution and destroying his land
But he couldn't, after all, even with all of Retere with him he was still but one man
And it was almost common knowledge at this point that Retere wasn't as powerful as the other beasts, all it would take would be one tranquilizer dart or something of the like to capture him, take him outside of Retere and kill him-
But the fact that he was Immortal was the flaw in the idea
Still Michael felt as if something was wrong and that he was losing somthin-
'Tommy! Oh crap! He git left behind in that blizzard!' Michael thought worried about his friend's safety
At that, Michael had to rest up to find Tommy first though, so he slept
-----------------‐--------------------[Scene Break]-------
Tommy slowly woke up to the smell of cooking of meat invading his nostrils, tempting him to join who ever rescued him from definite peril in breakfast
First opening his eyes he found that he was somehow unable to move
On closer inspection he found out that he was strapped to a flat stone a bit bigger than he was
His sudden movements though alerted who ever saved him
"Oh, you're awake? Well, you might be wondering why I strapped you horizontally to the rock there, right? Well, if you see who I am" the figure said, before taking of his scarf which was hiding his face to show a man he'd never want to meet in real life
Panicking he tried to escape, mustering what little energy he had to burning those ropes
"Now there, don't move, you want to live right? So stop moving and just don't attack me while I release you" Edward Brawn, a man who was said to rival the power of a grand army itself due to his sheer tenacity of him being able to improve his ice manipulation skills, despite being less than fourty, and one of the younger beast holders
If he was with Michael right now, he knew that he could easily kill him
Even if he was a junior to Edward by about twenty or so years
He would be fine with Michael by his side..
The problem would be that he wasn't with Michael
He tried squirming out of the ropes that binded him but Edward just looked at him weirdly
After trying to get out of his predicament he just gave up
"So.. you want to get out or what?" Edward just asked with a nervous smile on his face
"Why did you save me? You know I'm with the S.S right? Are you trying to get back at Michael through me? Because that definitely won't work, he barely even cares about me.. I mean I have been working towards warming up his heart and all but I still can't confess to him that I'm-" Tommy began to ramble
Edward just put some tape over Tommy's mouth
"Man you talk alot, how does that kid even deal with you?" Edward mumbled before letting Tommy loose
Edward, as a good sign of faith shared a message with Tommy, before sending him off, with the tape still on his mouth
-----------‐-----------------------[Scene Break]----------
Michael had been waiting these past few days in the bed, and finally he was able to walk
The damage he had recieved wasn't too much by his standards
But by an average man's, it could kill them from just a tenth of the hight he had fallen from, and let's not even talk about how much disarray his organs had been
Calem hadn't even let him off any day, constantly emulating Tommy's grin and mocking words to cause Michael to get easily irritable
He didn't know why the 'parasite' as he so lovingly called him would want to do so
But still, he was finally able to walk, with Serena[ The woman who saved him]'s help as she insisted to help him as much as she could
Michael didn't pry into the strange women's life that much, just asked who she is and constantly thanked her with the sum of an absurdly high number of Rands [the curruncy of the world] in favour for letting him stay at her cottage
Finally Michael was able to walk alone, with out Serena constantly wanting to make sure he was fine, with a little bit of persuasion and promising to come back to the cottage at a strict curfew of five in the evening
It was.. nice for Michael to have someone care for him, even if Serena didn't know who he was truly
"Hey mister! Can you get our kite from the tree?" A little blonde girl asked, her little brown eyes looking at him without the resentment nor malice that most people looked at him with now-a-days
Her friends were also mostly blonde children now that he looked at them
Some had light blonde hair, some dark blonde, but all of then with in that spectrum
The darkest the colors would go to were light brown in this village so most people ussually gawked at his foreign looking black hair
"Sure kid, where's the kite stuck at?" Michael asked, kneeling down to her height as she just pointed to the somewhat average tree where the red dragon kite was stuck
Michael just effortlessly climbed up the tree and swiftly grabed the kite before jumping down
Apparently that's all you need to show a child of that age how cool you are as they invited him to play for a bit
Now, usually Michael would say something along the lines of
"Scram, brat" if he were having a bad day, or "I'm really sorry but I just can't right now" with an apologetic smile if he was in a good mood
But now, Michael was trying to go back to his roots, and he needed some human.. well, just interaction with someone, be they alien or otherwise
So, he listened on to a few kids talks, and even shared some of his adventures with them; keeping note not to tell them of anything about him killing someone (he didn't want to lose their respect that he had gathered)
"So, there I was, surrounded by over a hundred men, I carefully leapt forward to dodge a few of their bullets, making sure to grab cover nearby.." Michael retold about the time he had gotten separated from Alan in ST.Marie
"And?" A small blonde boy asked, nearly looking to be eight
Even the other seven children looked forward to his stories
When he suddenly realised
It was getting dark soon
"I think you all should be going home soon" that got some whining out of the younger children while the three older ones just nodded, albeit a bit sad they didn't hear the end of the story
"Tell you what, I'll come by tomorrow again and we can continue off from where we left off, kay?" He said with a big smile
That put their hopes up quite high as they soon left for their houses
'You sure like children, not making them though I suppose..' Calem mocked, snickering a bit from inside his mind
Michael just rolled his eyes while walking back to the outskirts of the village where Miss Serena had her cottage
A simple two room cottage with room for two
She had apparently found himcovered in dried blood, broken bones and ripped clothes
She still didn't know how he healed up that fast in just a few days, and he hoped she would never know, not that she tried to pry off any information from him; she was just too polite for that.
"Where have you been mister?" Aunt Serena as Michael liked to call her asked with a bit of worry
"Do you know how much worried I got? I don't want you to do something reckless and.." she stopped midway in, her onyx black eyes with the look he almost never got besides from anyone but a small amount of people
Michael had seen that look quite a few times
Ranging from The loli Principal's reaction to him taking on Edward alone or something else and her worrying about it to even Alan when he found out he was training in using the soul clones
Alan..
"I know, but it's just that I got caught up in helping those kids out by getting their 'Great R.E.D Dragon' mite out of a tree.. yeah, they roped me into playing with them.." Michael said while grinning nervously
He could see her eyes having looming sadness at the mention of the Great R.E.D
He knew she probably lost a family member or friend to it
'Great, now I definitely have to watch out from leaking out my identity to her'
"So, dinner then?" She asked trying to take her mind off of The Great R.E.D most likely
"Yeah, dinner would be fine.." Michael just weakly responded
---------------------------------[Scene Break]---------
While strolling around the village he had gotten used to the looks he recieved for his usual hair color aswell as eye color
He was just wearing a red shirt and his black pants that he had thankfully brought along before the trip to the mountains, the same red shirt that Tommy had pestered him to buy
'Thank god I actually listened to his 'advice' to buy this shirt..' Michael said, in contrast to his negative thoughts during his mission at ST.Marie
He noticed the kids from yesterday, they were playing somesort of game based on the legends of The Great R.E.D's defeat by the hands of Okami Ohara
Michael felt a bit uncomfortable with them basically talking and playing about with an important portion of his life, but he, unknowingly told them alot about Lalazhard's sealing
"They say there were rumours that The Great R.E.D could destroy mountains with it's claws!" The girl from yesterday said to the others, making a clawing motion to express her words as actions
"Well, not unless he's in his true form, otherwise it's just his tail doing most of the work" he said nonchalantly correcting her little mistake
The children didn't even question how he knew it, just asking how much he knew about Lalazhard or The Great R.E.D as they called it
"How big is he mister Miguel?" The small blonde boy asked, his small brown eyes looking at Michael looking for an answer
Michael just looked at him with a smile and said
"He's a lot more bigger than what you're told, but to be fair, he's not as dangerous as you think!" Michael said from his sat down position as the other children looked at him with incredulous looks, the older ones looking at him with a tinge of suspicion in their eyes
"Well, he's more like a lazy lizard" that got a few snickers from the children
"And he's usually just lazing about, ya know, like right now.. man he's almost always sleeping" Michael said with a grin
"How do you know that?" The little girl asked
Michael just grinned at her while pointing at his chest with his thumb
"Well, that's because he's sealed right here"
That got all of their's attention
"But how?" They all asked at the same time while a few of them sceptical at his claim
He just summoned his dagger to show them
"Cool!" 7x rang out from their mouths, collectively looking at the dagger
"But how is he sealed in you, mister Miguel?" The young girl, whose name he definitely should ask, asked
"Well, it's simple, the child who The Great R.E.D was sealed in was me.. and it was done by my Father.. Okami.." Michael said
And then directly asked them not to tell anyone, that it would be their little secret
He didn't want the villagers to know who he was, much less Aunt Serena
But he knew that the children wouldn't blab.. and even if they did, he was planning on leaving today, so no harm done
------------------------------------[Scene Break]-----
Some random couple, one brown haired man and his light brown haired girlfriend were strolling around at the local park near the woods, tonnes of children and people having a picnic there they felt safe
How wrong they were to be lulled into that false sense of security, as a weird looking white colored creature soon came, looking hungry
On closer inspection, they saw that it was a bear, but it looked to be three or four times bigger than the average bear, clearly the result of Edwards appearance in the mountains would have caused the bears of the surrounding areas to change, mutate and adapt to the chaotic energy he had released during his first few months healing there
The couple screamed and tried to run away, many other people doing the same, trying to run away, but the bear quickly caught uo to them before slicing them up-
Or so they though, as a figure wearing a red shirt and black pants arrived at the Scene, tackling the beast aside
"Are you two okay?" The figure asked them, he looked to be slightly higher than even above average human males, standing at around about 5'9
His blue eyes looking over them in concern
Blue ... blue eyes
Black hair and a red and black dagger
"A-a-are y-you the c-crimson" the man tried to ask, fearful at having encountered the ominously dubbed 'Crimson Knight' by the U.A.F soldiers that had somehow escaped his wrath at ST.Marie, his trademark blue eyes and black hair alongside a red and black dagger/sword clueing them in on his identity
"I can't answer that, but jhst know I'm not here to hurt you.. I'm here to kill what ever that thing is" he said, his dagger suddenly erupting in hot flames; that somehow didn't burn him
He quickly dashed towards the bear, said creature still in a daze from being knocked off so harshly
He took a few quick stabs at the bear, forcing it to retreat, but not unscathed as indicated by the burn marks the fire had done to it's skin
"Oh no you don't" he mumbled, quickly making two clones to help kill the bear
He knew what it was, but why would a bear mutate like this, especially when there isn't any beast that had taken this area?
His mind racing at the possibilities, one such thought that came to his mind being that it might be a naturally occuring ice type bear or something, but thae fact that it had light blue eyes with slits in them indicated other wise
His clones had turned it over, cutting it's limbs off painfully using their daggers
It would be vomit inducing for him if he hadn't used code:0 when he'd heard the screaming coming from the masses in the local park
Quickly puting it out of its misery, Michael wished it's soul peace, where ever it end up in
"When did I get.. so cruel? So uncaring about when I kill.. I don't even think when we talk about resting in peace that we even mean it...." One of the clones asked him-self(?)
"I don't know.. but I think it's the code:0, what ever it is, it's not good for us.. I don't even think I even feel any sort of emotion when I use them" another clone said, no emotion visible on his face, proving his point were the icy blue eyes peering at the original in curiosity
Perhaps he wanted to know what he thought
"Let's just get going.. no guessing that the village will just kick me out now.. well, you two go and write up a 'thank you' letter, and give Aunt Serena that amount we promised her" sith that they split off
---------------------------------[Scene Break]-----
The Original Michael wasn't wrong, as all the looks he'd gotten were of disgust, jealousy/envy and even malice.
"Get out of our village you lizard freak!" A few of the villagers spoke as he just sadly smiled at the children he'd met two days ago, they were looking at him, wondering what was going on
"Mister Miguel! Hang on!" The blonde girl started after Michael just tried to run away, not being able to keep his thoughts still
He suddenly stopped..
The girl had followed him here, even though her parents had probably told her not to talk to him
She smiled at him, though she was a little tired from running, so the smile faltered a bit every now and then
"I- I just wanted to tell you that.. I don't think you're bad!" She blurted out while panting a bit
"Yeah, well, it's not like I can help it.. people believe what they want to, and their belief is that I'm somehow the cause of all the evil in this world or something.. or maybe it's because they're scared of me.. they called me the Crimson knight.. you want to know why?" Michael asked her, giving her a moment or two to catch her breath
She was just six or so years younger than him
He still hadn't gotten her name yet..
"Well, you know about the continent of ST. Marie?" Michael asked as his cold eyes peered through her, as if trying to see through her
"Yeah" she weakly responded, her short blonde hair swaying a bit due to the wind
"The on who liberated it was me.. alone.. in under a month, I had taken total control of the whole continent with out any army backing me.. that's why they fear me, they call me the Crimson knight because thats all that was there on the battlefield, me; the 'Knight' and the Crimson blood sprayed on the ground around the thousands of bodies on the ground" he said, taking a slow pause at around the last section
The blonde just looked at him and said
"So what! I know you had a reason to do all of that.. and besides.. I- I don't think you're that bad" she said mumbling the last part with a small blush on her face
Michael just smiled at her
'Hey, look! Finally! A female that actually takes interest in you! Now all we need is for you two to get set up in the bed room and-' Calem said with a lecherous grin, don't ask Michael how he knew.. he just knew
'Oh shut it, she's not even twelve at most!' He countered while rolling his eyes
"Will.. will we see each other again?" She asked a bit saddened to see him go perhaps
"Maybe.. maybe not.. I'll try my best though.. and say hi to your friends for me" he said while walking off
"Goodbye! Mister Miguel!" She yelled out while waving
Michael just gave her a small smile and said, with a two fingered salute
"Call me Michael, Michael Ohara, kid"
'You know.. I never really got her name..'
---------------------------------[Scene Break]--------
Serena had been the victim of a tragedy, but not of what Michael thought had happened to her family
Her brother was murdered nine years ago, her cousin went missing on that very same day and her nephew... her dear nephew had been thought as dead in the event aswell
She had moved out of the heroes village for that reason, after all, if she didn't have any family there, no.. no one there had survived, so it was right of her to move away
Although it had pained her to move away from her ancestral home, the place that her ancestors had occupied for the last two thousand or so years, but she had to
So many memories plagued her mind of the happy times, when Randy, Yuuchirou and Okami... no.. her brother, were raising her nephew..
Then, just a few days ago; she had found someone that looked an awfully lot like her brother, maybe another Ohara, but she hadn't the time for such thoughts back then
The young man had been covered in blood, his shirt mostly, but dried blood indicated that he had been there for quite some time, he even had his jackets and shirt ripped apart in the middle
So, she took him back, hurrying to see if she could save him
And she was overjoyed when he woke up, although it was slightly weird for her, it was almost like he knew she had carried him back but she didn't bother with it
Then, he started insisting that he was fine, and even she knew it was as such, but it was bewildering how fast he'd healed
In just a few days he was walking on his own
She usually went into the forest and looked for herbs, plants and flowers for her business back at the village(whom had always thought of her as 'exotic' for some reason, maybe due to her hair and eye color, but all the guys in the village had tried hitting on her.. they didn't know how old she was though) and sometimes even the man she'd rescued, he called himself Miguel and she was a bit saddened that he wasn't an Ohara but she still started to grow a bond with him
She felt as if she knew him..
She treated him like a mother would be, albeit a strict mother, but a mother none the less
Maybe it was her way of coping with her losses, maybe she had just clinged on to Miguel; hoping that he could stay with her, let her treat him like family.. but she knew he had to go.. if not today, someday, and she wouldn't be able to stop him
So imagine her surprise that when she came back to her cosy little cottage at the outskirts of the village (a little outcasting on their behalf, but she enjoyed the quiet lifestyle the location brought along) was a note, written by apparently Miguel, and a hefty sum of money.. maybe even enough that she wouldn't have to work another day again!
The note read
"Thank you, Aunt Serena, can I call you that? Well, that's enough rambling, I digress, to the side of this note should be about a hundred thousand Rands, as promised for allowing me to stay at your humble abode, and by your kitchen should be a deer I'd caught, I hope you enjoy it"
She wanted to cry, maybe from joy, maybe from sadness
She knew Miguel would come back, maybe, maybe not in reality, but she wanted to believe he would
She had lost too much and she didn't want to experience any more loss
So she took off, in search for anyone who could tell her where Miguel had gone
Everyone who she asked would just grumble something about 'damned lizards' and walk away
She had begun to lose hope when a young blonde girl she'd recognised as one of the children Miguel had helped came to her
She asked
"Auntie, didn't Mister Miguel stay with you? What.. what do you think of him?" She asked with sadness in her eye, and maybe a tinge of judgement building up in her voice and tone
"I.. I saw him.. as a son.. I guess.. do you know where he is?" She asked, gaining a little bit of lost hope from the young blondes smile
"No, but he told me he'll come back!.. but.. do you know.. of the great R.E.D?" She suddenly asked, confusing her
"The Great.. R.E.D? What of it?" She asked her
"Didn't you know? Miguel didn't tell you?" She asked, her voice telling of her faltering surety for telling her.. something, what? She didn't know
"No? What should he have told me then?"
"That The Great R.E.D was sealed in him!"
Oh god, how could she have been so blind..
The name itself..
Miguel... Michael
Her nephew...
That day she cried tears of joy perhaps, sadness maybe, but not of disgust of being tricked or any other emotion Michael might have predicted
---------------------------------[Scene Break]-------
Tommy had dropped a bomb on him, metaphorically
The fact that it was Edward Brawn who saved Tommy