TONIGHT WAS GOING TO be a special night because it was the only time Stephen could get an up-close look at Dyna Blades!
Climbing out of his window, he got atop his ceiling. He then hung down by his fingers, kicked off the walls, and twirled in the air. As his feet touched the ground, he rolled to soften his landing. The Steller's Jay flew around him until it landed on his shoulders.
"Oh," he said. "So, you wanna come with?"
The bird chirped as if it understood what he was saying. Smirking lightly, Stephen took off running.
Besides being atop a hillside, his neighbourhood wasn't different from any other rural area in Utah. A few turns around corners and some leaps over a couple of stone staircases later, he managed to make it safely to the park. The Steller's Jay rested on his shoulders as he sat by a bench. There was nothing to do except wait.
A few moments passed until he began to hear footsteps. Turning to see who it was, he noticed Kimberly.
"Steph, I've been looking for you! Just what are you doing at this hour?"
Wondering how Kimberly found him, he noticed a flock of birds flying around in a pattern.
"Shush," he said, placing his finger over his lips. "It's about to start."
"Eh?"
Suddenly, a grinding sound was heard. It grew louder and louder until a girl sporting pink hair flew over thirty feet above the two! Her long hair waved across the night sky as she performed three consecutive spins with her legs wide open.
"Dyna Blades…" Kimberly said.
Stephen remained silent, watching the girl perform another fantastic stunt in the air. He neither knew who she was nor what school she went to. All he knew was that she looked like part of the flock when she jumped high.
"That girl always comes to practice here during this time," he said, admiring her form.
"You came here to see her?"
"It's nothing like that. Besides, I don't even think she knows I exist. I just wonder how it feels…"
Kimberly looked at him. Usually, Stephen had a calm and collected attitude about everything, but she had never seen him so passionate about this.
"…How it feels to fly with the birds like that."
The pink-haired girl grinded off the telephone poles before bouncing off to skid across three roofs. Kimberly looked to see how invigorated he was at the thought of flying.
"Why don't you try Dyna Blades?" she asked. "Maybe you'll get along with her."
Stephen laughed at the suggestion. When Kimberly asked him what was so funny, he said it was just a thought.
Dyna Blades weren't something he could afford. And the last thing he would do was ask for thirteen thousand dollars to splurge on a pair of super skates. Besides, he wasn't one to covet worldly things. That's just who Stephen Huntley was: a teen with a mature mindset who was willing to be patient.
The girl performing Dyna Blade tricks eventually vanished into the night, prompting the two to decide it was time to leave. On their walk home, Kimberly apologized for what happened.
"What're you apologizing for?"
"Oh… ugh. It's because my sisters made you go back out. And when you came back, they said you couldn't have dinner."
Stephen couldn't help but smile. He touched her shoulder and said it wasn't her fault.
"But I made sure to make you a plate and left it in your room!"
This was precisely Kimberly's personality. No matter how bad things looked, she always tried to help. Considering that the two were the same age, with Stephen only being a few months older, she found it comforting to speak with him.
"Hey, Kim."
"Y… Yeah."
"You saw my fight with Chan, didn't you?"
"I did," she replied happily. "You really handed it to him!"
"Oh… Then why'd you wait until that girl asked me out to make a scene?"
Kimberly's face grew red. It was clear that Stephen was only teasing her, but she fell right into it. Assuming that she genuinely was watching the entire fight, why would Maxwell choose to holler at her? He wouldn't have had a reason to speak up unless she deliberately said something to agitate him.
"I promise, it's not what you think!" she said, waving her hands back and forth.
Stephen let out a slight chuckle, stating that he was only joking. He didn't share the same feelings whether she secretly liked him or not. Most girls didn't attract him anyway. His mind was more focused on Dyna Blades.
The next day, Stephen returned to the Central Salt Lake City warehouse after school. The place was a tad rundown, so he figured he'd spruce it up.
At the warehouse's entrance, something felt odd to him. There wasn't a single person outside. Things were quiet—an abnormal scene for gang territory. The moment he opened the door, he was greeted by fifteen black-robed individuals with skull masks on.
And they were all wearing Dyna Blades!
"You're not from the Eastside," Stephen calmly said.
"No," a man said behind the mask. "We're not…"
Stephen quickly bolted toward the exit. Fifteen guys wearing Dyna Blades wasn't something he could take on alone. As he raced toward his bicycle, he could hear the sounds of multiple wheels spinning simultaneously. Suddenly, the group crashed through the walls and surrounded him.
'They're fast!' he thought, putting his guard up.
A man with a pair of tonfas rushed at him. Swinging them, Stephen just barely managed to duck. He seized that opportunity to uppercut the man right in the spleen. Getting behind him to attempt a German suplex, the man's Dyna Blades rolled on the ground before propelling him up!
'What the?!' Stephen thought as he lost his hold.
He had never fought someone using Dyna Blades before. It was unfair.
The man grabbed Stephen by the neck and dragged him across the ground. Stephen tried to regain his balance, but they were moving too fast. By the time he realized it, his body had flipped in response to the man performing a trick to ride up the warehouse walls. The two were seen over twenty feet above the ground after one bounce!
"I heard you're good at fighting," the man said, holding Stephen upside down. "Can you tell me what happens to the head when it gets dropped from this height?"
The two were descending faster than he could think. A sense of panic fell upon Stephen's heart. As he saw himself getting closer to the ground, he closed his eyes, only to hear wheels skid across the pavement. Opening his eyes, he couldn't tell what position he was in.
All he knew was that his hair was mere centimeters from the ground.
The man laughed, holding him upside down.
"Haha! This is the famous West gang leader?"
Sweat poured from Stephen's face. His breathing was heavy. This couldn't be members from the East attacking him. Gang turfs were honored every year, no matter what the outcome.
"Chan sure owes us a lot for this one. Haha!"
'Chan?' he thought to himself.
Despite being dragged around like a ragdoll, he still had enough reasoning to connect the dots. Whoever these people were, Chan must have hired them. He must have felt ashamed—humiliated even—after losing his fight for the third straight year.
"Let's show 'em why high schoolers should stick to books!" the man yelled.
For the next half hour, Stephen was beaten senselessly. He tried to hold his own but eventually wore himself out. After his beatdown, they trashed the warehouse and dismantled his bicycle. It was clear he would lose against fifteen people wearing Dyna Blades that could move several miles an hour without feeling exhausted.
Stephen laid there, back against the ground, with blood running down his nose, lips, and cheeks. His clothes were torn, his left eye was swollen, and he had wheel tracks all over his body.
'Dang… Dang it. It hurts! It really hurts!'
It took some time until he could finally muster enough strength to get up from the ground. His body ached all over. It almost felt like his shoulder was dislocated. All that training he'd done to grow strong was trodden down by inline skates.
What was he to do except limp home in failure?
When he finally made it home late at night, he kept his head down. Victoria was the first to notice him, so she said, "What the heck happened to you?"
Stephen ignored her, walking straight into his room before shutting the door behind him. He then laid down on the bed, trying to ignore how painful his body felt. Two voices could be heard outside his door. If he were to guess, they were probably Kimberly or Victoria since Allison went away on her business trip for two months.
Whispers from Kimberly, saying she would take revenge on whoever did this to him, were heard. Stephen didn't like the idea, thinking, 'Just what can you do?'
It wasn't long until the pain finally stopped, and he eventually fell asleep. Waking up to wash off all the dried blood from his body, he noticed the house was empty.
'They didn't seriously go out to take revenge for me, did they?' he asked himself.
The thought quickly faded, just as it came. His roommates were protective, yes, but they didn't have any idea who his perpetrators were. Even Stephen hardly knew who they were. If anything, they probably went to the police to make a report.
Stephen cleaned up his face and placed some bandages over the wounds. He then went to get an ice pack for his swollen eye. Hanging on the refrigerator doors with magnets was a note. When he noticed it had his name on it, he took it off and saw two other sticky notes behind it.
"But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also. Matthew 5:39. So let us handle the rest, ya dufus!"
Victoria had signed that note. Flipping to the other note, he saw that Mila had written it. She didn't sign it, but he could tell from her childish handwriting that it was from her.
'Brother Steph, you stink at defending yourself! Learn to count on others for once.'
The fact that she knew how to spell words correctly while giving them deep meaning was more interesting. As for her advice, Stephen wasn't going to take it. He didn't like the idea of relying on others. What troubled him, however, was why his roommates left him these messages.
Flipping to the last and final note, he saw that it was from Kimberly. In it, she wrote, "Even though birds can fly in the sky, the reason you can't is because you're always clinging to the ground—"
He finished reading the rest of the note. Whatever the reason they were written, he knew one thing: They had gone out to find his assailants. He wasn't going to let them fight alone. As such, he looked through their rooms, hoping to find a clue.
After searching every nook and cranny, he didn't find anything. All that was left was a closet door in the kitchen. He stared at it for a moment. Out of all the doors in the house, this was the only area Allison had prohibited him from ever entering.
Finding the key to where he knew Allison hid them from years of living with her, he unlocked the door and opened it. Sitting on a pedestal before him was a pair of Dyna Blades. That's when he recalled what the last lines of Kimberly's letter said: '—you're always clinging to the ground. However, since your wings are so grand, I'm sure someday you'll fly higher than everyone!'