Author's Notes: I finally got around to writing a Storm Hawks origin story! I know, the first fan fiction I ever wrote was a Storm Hawks origin story, but it was written before the second season was out and is no longer canon. Ever since then, I have wanted to write one. I was thinking of doing something like a medieval knight's to explain the becoming of a Sky Knight (a work I was calling Knighthood) but that was before "Origins" came out and ruined the whole idea. So until now, I've done no chapter fics on the Storm Hawks' origins and have been wanting to.
This story is based, somewhat loosely but still lining up a little, on the original story line. Not the one in the published work of Storm Hawks, although it goes along with that one, too. The main plot of this fic is based on the rough draft of Storm Hawks, which I found a couple months ago on a webpage that, unfortunately, no longer exist. (Otherwise I'd put up the address.) I'll tell all of you the plot since it's not on the internet anymore, but rather than put it here, I plan on putting the summary of that plot on my profile.
At the beginning of each chapter there will be a quote that goes along with all or a significant part of the chapter. Why? Don't know. Really, I don't know. Maybe I thought it would add a little spice to the fic?
Whatever, I've done enough talking. Just enjoy!
Storm Hawks—The Dawning
By WhispertheWolf
Prologue: On Bleeding Wings
All has been looted, betrayed, sold; black death's wing flashed ahead.
~Anna Akhmatova
He stood against the sky, his black battle glider open on his back behind him. The skies around him darkened to red with the Firebolt crystals' power, the ever threatening sign of approaching Cyclonians. Soon to be his trademark sign.
It was a great sign. It reddened the skies like blood.
Red was always your color, Lightning Strike, he thought with a smirk. Now it is the color of your hopes and dreams and all you love.
The skimmer on which he stood was new, and the best of the best. The Switchblade Elite was the tope vehicle, even faster and better equipped than the Air Skimmer III Ultra. It was black, black as the night and eternal darkness. And there was also red upon it, so that it appeared bathed in blood. And soon it would be.
With the sky pelting, crystal pulses dripping like blood droplets, he stayed statue-still at first. In his new uniform and his new black glider and his black hair shading his eyes, he was nothing but a dark silhouette, beautiful, awing, and terrifying. His open glider looked like black angel wings. A dark angel, ready to swoop in and bring terror and devastation. A fallen angel, risen again. A demon doing the devil's work.
It was time to end this once and for all.
The Storm Hawks were gone, thanks to his hand. But it wasn't over. Lightning Strike, the Sky Knight, used to tell him much about the family he had left on Terra Nimbus. Now, after these years of spreading terror and finally reaching this terra, the terra where it all began, he was going to extinguish the flame left of the Storm Hawks, nothing more than a spark.
Lightning had a wife. And with her, a son. An heir.
Master Cyclonis had been quick to approve the invasion. Terra Nimbus was important. It was the place where the first skyride, called an Air Skimmer, had been invented. This terra had united the terras by providing ways to get from one place to another besides the dragons, which only the Knights could use. It was because of the skyride that the feared dragons were extinct and because of the skyride that the Empire even existed. Cyclonia was poor before it could travel and conquer. But the skyride, and later the airship, changed everything, bringing about the Age of Sky Riders. Throughout Atmos it had released unrivalled prosperity, alliance, war, rogues, thugs, thieves, and anarchy.
And with the power of flight a long-ago Master Cyclonis was able to start her Empire. The devil had been given her wings.
And now it was his turn. With his new identify now preceding him, the Dark Ace was leading the Talons now.
With him was the empress's distant cousin, Snipe. A Talon commander himself, his sister (a more adequate ruler, in the Dark Ace's opinion) had already been given control of Terra Bluster. This terra, once conquered, needed an important ruler because of its significance. This would become Snipe's domain once they took it.
And today, it would be taken.
They swooped in without warning. The pulses rained down, as if the sky was crying blood in its grief. The screams rang out. The Dark Ace's eyes were fierce as he kept bringing his sword upon anyone, man, woman, and child. And the other Talons did the same. After all, the Dark Ace had glared them all down before the battle and said, "Leave no one left breathing on this terra. Burn everything."
"But sir," one had protested, "everyone? Even the civilians?"
The Dark Ace had leaned into his face. "Do you refuse a direct order?"
The Talon's eyes widened in fear, and he shook his head.
What the Dark Ace said next had chilled them all. "There are about five thousand people on this terra. And I only need five hundred people to run it. And I have a surplus of troops who can fill that role."
So here they were, many of them in a massacre they never wanted.
The Dark Ace didn't believe in filling the lesser Talons' little heads with needless details. So he didn't tell them that they were killing the civilians to assure that only one of them was dead for sure.
Lightning Strike's heir could not rise.
The fires burned. For hours upon hours, and then into a second day, the killing went on.
At last, all was silent, so silent that it pained the surviving Talons' ears. It rose in a clamber around them, only broken by the crackling of the last fire from one of the houses.
And the Dark Ace's dark silhouette stepped out of the fire. "Any survivors?" he asked Snipe.
"None at all," Snipe answered with a withering smirk.
"Good."
That was all the Dark Ace said.
Through the death and destruction, a lone biplane skyride was flying away as fast as its rider could push it, unnoticed by any Talons. A young boy with startled, tearful green eyes and hair that normally waved in the wind like red flame. Now, however, it was darkened by sweat, sticking to his face like blood.
The red wings of the skyride, very different from the red and black wings that brought destruction, carried the bleeding boy away. But to where, he didn't know.
Above him, unseen by him, flew a mysterious large bird-of-prey, the red-violet plumage of its body blending in with the reddening skies. Its dark blue tail twitched, rippling the blue stripe that ran up its back, around its neck, and up to its green face and the red-violet feathers that stuck up from its head. Its flame-colored wings ruffled in the breeze gently. It lowered its teal beak toward the boy, blinking its yellow eyes at him as if concerned.
But then the boy was swallowed up by fog, and the bird fluttered in confusion before flying off again.
Author's Notes: Ooh, dark beginning . . .
Yes, this fic is a little Aerrow-centric. Why? Because he's the character with the most information known about him. (Plus, he's the character I'm most interested in besides Radarr. He and Radarr kind of go together, too, so I get to do Radarr!) It will be primarily focused on Aerrow, Radarr, Piper, and Finn, mostly from Aerrow's point of view, but a lot of Piper and Finn there, too, with a bit of Radarr. Junko, Stork, Grimsley, and others will also feature as main points of view.
Who's the bird? Well, that might be easy for you to guess. Either way, I'm not telling.
Read and review, please!