The fallen star

At the Rising Star Training Academy, Zackiria puts his trainee’s to work on the rings or high bar. Making them do flips and twists and they had to land on their feet every time. In case they got knocked in the air in battle. Jessica proved to be the best at this by far. A young man walks in and looks around excitedly. Zackiria sees him but orders the others to keep doing what they’re doing. The two approach one another and the young man bows immediately. “Sir, my name is Aiden Clark, I’d really appreciate if you’d train me. I’ve heard so much about this place.” “Well, you certainly have good enthusiasm and respect.” Zackiria thinks for a second and then it’s like a lightbulb went off. “Wasn’t your father one of my students?” “Yes sir, he was. You helped him and I want to be just like him so I need your training as well.” “Well, you’re definitely coming here much sooner than your father did so I should be able to help you surpass him even.” “Thank you so much sir, you won’t regret this.” Aiden rushes out of there before Zackiria could stop him. Most likely to tell his father the good news.

Later, Zackiria let everyone do more meditation followed by mind skills testing. Many of them actually seemed more annoyed by the brain strengthening then by the body work, which seemed very odd to Zackiria since he always pushed them so hard with the physical test.

After Aiden returned, Zackiria took everyone out to a target practice range where they threw axes, knives, shurikens and used bow and arrows. There was also a sword duelling area for those interested. Zackira picked up a bow and arrow “We shall be training here for the next two hours.” “Excuse me sir.” Donna speaks up “Why are we using bows?” “Yeah.” Says a young male trainee. “Can’t we practice guns?” Zackiria glared at the request and the young guy backed away “Guns are loud and clumsy, we are using bows because not only does it develop your aim.” He puts an arrow in the bow and takes aim at a target. “But it takes strength to draw back a bow.” He turns his head to make sure they are watching, he releases without looking back at the target but hits a bullseye anyway. “After your time is up here, please try anything else here.” Everyone was very impressed with Zackiria’s accuracy and suddenly became egger to give it a try. Once they were done there, they did a marathon through the city and back to the academy.

A day later, in a barley furnished house, Jason watches the news. His gang had gone out and attacked some officers after killing a few members of a rival gang. The reporter, Thomas Richards, is trying not to make too light of the group calling themselves “The New Age Outlaws” considering the seriousness of the event. Jason turns off the TV in disgust, he would have to smack them around a bit once they got back to remind them who was in charge. He heads downstairs where he has Dylan chained up, he looked half-starved and heavily beaten. He tried to conceal the fear when he saw Jason and failed miserably. “Come on now. We’ve been at this long enough, we should be friends by now. Don’t you want to be friends?” “You sick son of a bitch.” “Leave my mother out of this. I can do so much worse to you but why go through all that?” “You’re just gonna have to kill me cause I’ll never help a fuck like you.” Jason makes a quick step forward and Dylan flinches. “I guess you’re going to need more convincing.” He walks away and leaves Dylan in the cold dark room.

“What about the Blade Runners?” one of the gang suggests. “No, I still like the outlaw thing.” another said “Yeah but for some reason the city thinks it’s a joke.” The first said. “Hydra?” suggests a third. “Hydra? You mean the multi-headed beast thing? Maybe.” The first says again “Come on guys, we got to agree on something.” a forth says. Then Jacob comes up and the conversation stops. He knows these idiots are coming up with a group name but he hardly cares what they call themselves. As long as it’s not stupid. He had to remind himself, this was a means to an end. “Forget the name for now you idiots. And lay off the cops. They’re not going to care that we’re taking out drug dens and shit but now that you morons killed a cop, they’re going to come after us.”

Zackiria has all the trainees doing leg based exercises, to strengthen the legs and balance. They may have felt like ballerinas at first but after an hour, their legs felt like they were going to crumble. After the hour was up, Zackiria said they could stop. They were more than happy to. They were asked to take a half hour break. When they returned Zackiria had large jugs of water for each of them. He made them balance the jugs on their heads while doing much of the same exorcise, without spilling any water. They did this new exorcise for ten minutes. “You did well. That is all for today. Take a bath, let your muscles relax and build back up. We’ll be working the upper body tomorrow.” Zakiria told them as he went to get a mop for the spillage. As they broke off one of the trainees, Tetsu drew Aiden’s attention. “Did that last bit of exorcise seem familiar to you?” “Yes, god. I know I saw that exorcise in Dragon Ball.” “I was thinking something more live action but, yeah, that too.”

Days later, there is another huge charity party going on in the museum. A rare diamond would be making an appearance there that day thanks to Kosh Lyson. Kosh mingles with the other rich and powerful people. Not far the mayor was being questioned about the sniper that ran amuck last month. Many people still thought he should have been caught sooner. Bobby D just thanked the chief and all involved who helped catch him. Saying, it’s not like a movie where the bad guy is caught in a few hours. Kosh stepped in and assured everyone that the sniper was a professional and no matter what, would be hard to find and catch. “Since the police very well can’t hire a psychic, since their all fakes anyways, no one could have predicted the attacks.” Kosh said. Bobby was happy someone intervened, he was losing popularity since the attacks but hopefully with more friends sticking up for him like this. People will see the sense and logic. That they did as much as they could. Kosh goes over to Danny Luv. “I hope you’re familiar with the security team and the layout. If someone tries to get that diamond coming in, which they will, I need to know it’ll be safe.” Kosh stated “Don’t worry sir, I’ll keep extra attention for that item.” Danny said.

Back at Rising Star, Zackiria watches Aiden do some of the stealth training he started during the sniper attacks. He proved to be a quick learner in these skills, perhaps a little of his father had rubbed off on him. The others were doing high bar training, chin ups and then they would hoist their bodies on the bar and do a push up. They interchanged between these for half an hour then did an uneven bar and ring routine. Then the trainees begin doing basic push-ups, after a while, everyone is done except for Aiden. Zackiria goes over to the man sprawled on the floor “What’s the matter, you already did forty five, why’d you stop?” Aiden could only get out the word “Pain.” “That’s how you know it’s working, your becoming a man, embrace it, push through the pain, five more, that’s all I’m asking for!” Zackiria said, Aiden mustered up the will power to finish the set and Zackiria reached out it hand to help him up “Rest for a few minutes but I expect you to beat that record very soon, that was the easy part.”

Chief of police, Joseph Alexander walked in and called Zackiria aside. Zackiria told them to continue and went over to his friend. Jacob didn’t like the looks of this, he looked at Kevin and could tell neither did he. “You saw the news the other day, did you?” Joseph asked “Yes your men responded to a gang war of some sort and were attacked.” “Yes. Well…” “You want my students to go after them?” “After last time you know I normally wouldn’t come to you, even though this is a low level gang, the real problem is their leader.” “What about him?” “He wasn’t there but we have word, a name was heard. It’s Bryers.” “Jason?” “Yes, your former student.” “How could he have chosen to live his life like this? How could he turn against me like this?” “That’s why I came to you. If it is him maybe you can talk some sense into him. If you can find him.” “I wouldn’t exactly know where to look.” “I hope for your sake I’m wrong and this gang will just fall out. They seem to be a little scatterbrained. But if he’s their leader, he’s strong, and he can make them stronger…I have to get back to work now anyway. See if you can find Jason, see if he is the gang leader.” “I hope not but I’ll see what I can do.”