Hey there everyone, Tucker here. So, for my first blog post i'm going to post a short I wrote up introducing a character for an as of yet unannounced story line, because doing one from a story that's already under the "stories" tab is obviously too mainstream. Obviously. And of course I'm not going to give you any backstory or explanations either, because this is story line that has yet to be announced. Honestly, you shouldn't even be reading this yet, so consider yourselves lucky. Lucky I say! Er, AHEM... now, on to the story.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A deafening noise, like that of a metallic dragon, rang in Raias’ ears and a misty darkness surrounded him. His thoughts were in tatters; his mind, unfocused. Slowly, images of an old, barely remembered memory faded in. It was a scene from his childhood; he was in a forest, but the details of the trees and foliage surrounding him were hazy. A shadow passed overhead and there was the movement of something big at his side. Turning, he looked up and saw his father as a giant standing smiling before him. Tears welled up in Raias’ eyes as he tried to reach out to him, to grasp his hand, to embrace him. But Raias couldn’t move. Desperately he tried to call out to his father, to tell him he missed him, to tell him he loved him. But Raias couldn’t speak.
His father smiled down at him once more and then pointed at something off in the distance. Without his consent, Raias’ view shifted in the indicated direction to show a massive, dark storm surging towards them at alarming speeds. In a frenzy, the trees whipped about with a life of their own and blazing streaks of lightning flashed across the sky. Surely they would be swept away in the storm, how could they not? What could possibly be more powerful than the full force of nature? Raias backed away in fear as the howling winds rushed forward, threatening to rip him from the ground. He was stopped, however, by a steady, warm embrace. In his ear, he could hear his father’s voice softly cut through the gale. “Don’t worry, I’m here.”
* * *
Groggily, Raias opened his eyes. His head was pounding, as if someone was continually beating the inside of his skull with a mallet. Still, he was alive and still strapped into his chair, so he couldn’t really complain. It was dark inside the cockpit of his ship; apparently the console, controls, viewport and pretty much everything else were offline, which meant that the magidrive had likely taken some damage. Using his seats built in magical energy receivers, he fed his own magic into the cockpit in order to restore power. He wouldn’t be able to fly anywhere this way, that would take far too much energy, but at least he could get some of the electronics and magical systems running again. As he felt the magic flow out of his body, the cockpit hummed with power and the lights popped on. With a few sparks the console lit up as well, seemingly serviceable, but annoyingly enough the viewports remained dark.
Raias clicked his tongue and ran a quick diagnostic of the ship. It looked like the magidrive was indeed non-functional, though he couldn’t tell how badly it had been damaged. The outer hull had also taken a beating but still seemed intact, and the thrusters were surprisingly in one piece. He was thankful that the defensive measures he’d taken just before crashing had been effective, though hopefully the toll said measures had taken on the magidrive weren’t too severe. Also, according to the diagnostics, the viewports didn’t appear to be damaged, which meant that they weren’t dark because they were broken, but because something was physically blocking them. Raias looked back and examined them closely. Indeed, he could just make out minute changes in the dark image being shown, though not anything discernable.
With a sigh, he cut off the flow of energy to the cockpit and everything once again went black. As he closed his eyes, he reached out mentally and grasped the shadows surrounding the ship. Using them, he sent out magical ripples through the darkness to map out his surroundings, similar to an enhanced form of echolocation. Above, below, in front of, and to the sides was a huge, solid something wrapping around his vessel; to the back of the ship, however, there was a mixture of solid objects ranging from tiny to large that seemed broken apart and jumbled. Beyond that the shadows didn’t reach so Raias could only assume that there was some form of light, and possibly a way out.
After a moment’s consideration, he decided that forcing his way through was the most feasible idea at the moment. He sent another magical ripple across the dark to test the waters, causing some of the smaller objects to rattle. The second pulse he sent out had more energy behind it, causing a low rumble to reverberate through the ship as everything around it shook. After a few seconds, though, the objects settled back into place and the noise stopped. Gathering his magic, he sent out a third pulse that caused the ship to shake and a rumble of even greater proportion. Then, before everything could settle back down, he sent out a large wave of energy that blasted the objects away with a cacophony of loud cracks. The shadows he was using receded as light poured in, meaning that freedom had been achieved.
Relieved, Raias opened his eyes and immediately became aware of the pounding in his head once more. That stunt had taken more out of him than he’d expected; those things had been quite heavy. Pushing the pain away, he undid the straps holding him to his chair and stood up slowly, making sure his legs were solid beneath him. He seemed to be fine, so he started making his way through the cramped, still darkened interior, heading towards the rear of the ship where a small access hatch was located. As he reached it, he placed his hand on another magical energy receiver beside the small port and fed it power. There was a metallic clink as the locks keeping the port shut disengaged and immediately the hatch was blown open by a strong gust of cold air, nearly kneecapping Raias in the process.
With a grunt, he dropped down through the opening and landed on solid rock. A large, broken cave appeared before him with light shining in from a ship sized opening at the other end. Labeling it a cave wasn’t quite right, Raias realized; it was more a tunnel that his ship had created upon impact. It seemed that the defensive measures he’d taken to save his vessel had turned it into a huge bullet, drilling into and through the stone when it impacted. He smiled slightly at the thought despite himself and made his way towards the light, making sure to keep his footing firm as loose rock littered the floor about him.
As he stepped out onto the ledge at the tunnel opening, his breath froze in his lungs. A wide, grey valley of stone spread out far below him with jagged cliffs and peaks jutting upwards in the distance, clawing into the blackened sky. Impossibly tall thunderclouds rolled across the horizon with flashes of lightning blasting through their dark interiors, as if some terrible battle was taking place inside of them, and in the far distance, past the valley and cliffs, the atmosphere took on a light, eerie green that gave off an ominous sense of foreboding. The land had an unearthly beauty to it and as another hard gust of wind blew past Raias, throwing his hair into a frenzy, he couldn’t help but grin in delight at the raw power of nature being put on display before him. This was Rozran, and this is where he would find Sylna.
