Dusk City, one of the Twin cities and sister city to Dawn City, is known for its shady inhabitants and mysterious nature along with a fickle crime rate. It has many nicknames; City of Madness, Concert Black Forest, and Devils City, just to name a few. Its many scattered alleys and streets make a web of chaos, a guess of an image of a madman's mind. Dusk City hides many activities, legal and non-legal, for certain purposes. Old houses and buildings of long ago are used as cheap hotels, gang bases, and other less than lawful uses.
Also, this dark city has seven levels because the city is built on a huge pit that is as big as the city itself, it's fair to say that Dusk City was inserted into the pit (whoever built the Twin Cities is a Divine Comedy fan). Its tallest tower is put into the deepest pit of the ancient sinkhole. What made this sinkhole is an underground cave that goes down, with a weak roof and too many heavy dinosaurs stomping on it, evidence of a mass grave of dinosaur bones at the bottom of the deep pit supported that theory.
Dusk City's Top Level is a place known for being a perfect place to film noir movies as it keeps classic air around it, but do not lose your guard for you may lose something. The lower levels are easier to hide things, especially lowest level but no one dares to do so without an arsenal of flashlights, for who knows what lurks in the darkness of Dusk City.
The police force there are hardened souls who patrol restlessly as they observe and uphold the law. They know every trick of The Darken City as they are raised in its shadow. They trained to be resistant to every type of bribe that a criminal can give. So, the only option for criminals to hide their activities is to go down where no sane cop dares to go, the pitch-black abyss levels. Only the fires that are down there are the only lights underground due to how thick and hard the unknown metal walls of this ancient city are. Their smoke goes through the filters above to clear the filthy underground streets, well as much as the pipes can go. Their heat absorbed as energy and being part of the city's heating system, hence the warm to hellish temperatures the streets have. Deeper down you go the colder it gets.
Yet the cold sinks down as the heat rises to tops of the towers of Dusk City and one of the buildings is a cloaked young man, dressed in colors of the city of shadows. The cloak is a very dark shade of blue, the color of midnight, the jacket is black as a stormy night with electric blue lightning bolts on the ends of the sleeves and near where the zipper line is. The jet-black jacket also has a logo on the back that six bright neon blue lightning bolts forming together two K's merged back-to-back.
The black hiking pants are customized with colors of bright shades of blue lightning bolts lining up pants legs. At the ends of the pants legs are blue and red flames. The footwear is a custom hybrid of sneakers and army boots, which also have electric blue lighting on the lines of the shoes. In the shadow of the hood, a pair of two glowing blue eyes, with strange black markings on them, gaze over the shadows of alleys of abyss. They have a mixed aura of sadness, anger, yet restless determination as they formed into powerful energy born from his will to endure.
Then the hooded late teenage boy looks up at the storm torn sky stitched with lightning bolts and filled with the booming roars of thunder. A sudden lighting's flash lit the teenager's light tan face framed by very deep brown hair. His face appeared emotionless before he took a deep breath in and took a leap of faith. Suddenly he transformed into a flock of bats that flew above the city of shadows before going down to an empty alley then turning back into human form. Then the teenager landing on his feet perfectly before he stands up, look around, while walking to the dark, empty alley when he hears a scream, a cry for help, "Ahhhh!"
He looks around, thinking "'Better not be late!' then turns and runs to the source of the sound. There he found a gang of people that are dressed in clothes of identical colors and style: ice blue and stormy grey, they are harassing a young poor girl. The young man knew that he must act now before things get worse for the girl.
He edges around, looking for the boss of the gang to start his ambush. The guy is obvious due to how much treasure on him. Apparently, there's never too much bling for this guy due to how much jewelry on him as Kyle mutters, "Too bright in gold and not the brains." The boss never knew what hit him as chaos and mayhem ensured afterwards.
Pow! "Oof!" Flew a shortie as he becomes a bird before hitting a wall.
Bam! "Ow!" A chubby guy fell like a chopped oak tree.
"Oh! Not the face!" Crunch~! "…. Mommy…." Thud. Less said about that the better…. He is fine for the most part… Though he might not have any children of his own.
Needless to say, if he were bloodthirsty, it would be a bloodbath. Instead, it is a beatdown of many as the boy is a blur of motion with an unconscious pile of the beaten in his wakes. What was left of the gang is a big pile of gangsters gathered up by the male teenager as then he observes the girl and her condition that she was in. Then the boy mutters, "That takes care of them… Now let's get some medical care for you."
She has mixed features of Europe and Asia that fit beautifully on her round face making it hard to figure out what feature is more dominant. Her skin is pale of unhealthy shade as if she were stuck underground for a while, a common feature of those who live deep in the darkness of lower levels. The lack of sunshine does that for you, especially for a long time. He has seen people that pale due to living deep down in the underworld of the city of shadows. This leads to the nickname of the residents; Ghosts, as they are sneaky and cunning due to their dark underground environment. But her skin looks flawless with no scars to be seen. But it seems like she sees things that she wishes to forget but she can't undo her memories of them as she shivers not because of the cold but of terrible things. His caring sidekicks as he walks up to her unconscious form.
"Looks like she is in shock…" The young man muses as he picks her up and carries her to his home, all while ignoring certain thoughts in his head as he fights his blush down from his face. It's bad manners to leave a lady in the dark alley. You never know what lurks in the darkness of the city, at best you have just shadows, at worst you get nightmares that get boogeymen shaking in their shoes and wet themselves in fear for there are rumors of illegal experiments in the underworld, some that resulted in creating monsters that could have from a horrific video game. This why the police force is hardened and wary of the shadows, cause their life might depend on it. Some groups hide better than others as those who don't get exposed to the city's crime fighting force.
The kingpins hide in the shadows, never will control the police force due to the leadership made of 7 people who shows the traits the 7 Virtues which is the elite task force of the city, however there's a danger in the shadows that can threaten them due to a few brushes of death with some now dead but once formidable enemies, which built their caution of the tricks of the underworld of Dusk City. But the criminals who step into their territory are on their own as the 7 virtues protect their homes with their lives. And some criminals don't survive if they are wanted dead by the law.
Kyle knows this as he is a friend of one of their younger members of the 7 Virtues, Humility as he's the Omega of the group, always willing help his team and family along with the innocent as he is creative and resourceful plus he leads the police force of Dusk City.
Then the girl started to wake up with her eyes starting up and taking in her surroundings before her eyes sets on him. Then she blushes slightly at the position she is in, but she doesn't get off him due to several factors: One, she is not in the best condition, two, she doesn't know where to go, and three is a secret but she knows that she can trust him.
And then the boy asked, "My name's Kyle. What's your name?" The girl cutely stammers, "M-my name is Esther." Her eyes darted to place to place, her legs shivering in, not the cold, but in fear like she had seen hell's gates and felt the hellish heat. She had no visible wounds, but her soul was burned, her innocent nature gone, and she needed recovery not in her body but in her spirit and mind.
When they got inside his home, Esther sees the place as it looks like it was cleaned up a bit yet felt like it once a family home. The walls are red, white, blue, and black. Kyle then carries the young lady to the guest room and set her on the couch. Then he went to his bedroom to change his clothes. Then Esther then did what she didn't do in a long time, sleep peacefully. Kyle came back with a pair of red pajamas before he noticed that her clothes were torn up from stretching so much by a growing girl. And Esther did live up to her namesake as she is beautiful.
Kyle blushed crimson red as he tosses the pajamas on her before high tailing out of there and close the door. As much as he wants to watch, it's better to be a gentleman… and beat it or be beaten.
Then suddenly he hears a laughing voice of madness inside his head, "Well, looks like you got quite a catch. She is going to be smoking hot when she gets fully mature that's for sure! Better keep an eye on your new girlfriend!" Kyle barks, "Zip it Kai" Kai persisted, "She looks good in those, so when she gets old enough to be legal, are you…" "No!" Kyle howled as his face turned redder than before. "Ok, Ok. I will not push it any further but when we get our old pals back, we're going to tease you about it!" Kairung's snickers could be heard as Kyle thought, 'Great, thanks for that idea. Yup, I am in for it…'
He face-palmed as the young man opens a secret compartment which holds a photo book. Kyle opens it up to see the pictures of his past adventures. He goes to a page with him with three other people. One of them, the tallest and bulkiest, adult man with brown hair and wielding a heavy buckler of a Keyblade. The other guy besides Kyle was a young blond teenager wielding a keyblade indirectly. The only woman in the picture is a beauty with blue hair and 'ahem' big bounties. She would be considered a knockout with her mature figure and curves. The blonde boy and the bluenette maiden were blushing as they were shoved together by the man and a young boy whose hair is half white (on the left), half black (on the right). His left eye is red while the other one is blue. He has a smug smile like he knows something that the 'love birds' don't…like the fact they have a crush on each other without the other knowing about it. The young boy has two keyblades that look like dragon heads and their wings for the teeth of the blade with the shaft being beams of fire or lighting. The keychains are dragon heads, black for one and white for the other. They connect to decorative armbands of their respective colors. His hands twitch with the same energy as he searches for allies that bring back an army of a lost warrior class, the Keyblade Wielders, to save those who are his lost friends and help him fight for the ones who pass away. Those who he will never forget for the rest of his life. This also reminds him of a score to settle with a dark master of keyblade, a wicked man with illusions of grandeur. The same illusions that blind him from what he is actually doing to his surroundings, destroying or corrupting everything in his wakes to pursue an empty goal. Therefore, Xehanort must be stopped with as few casualties as possible.
For all that young man knows that the dark master is out there, calculating and scheming in the darkness of a body that is not his, one that is a friend of this young man. The dark wicked master must be stopped before he bathes the worlds in the darkness of his madness.
He then turns a page to see a picture of two teams. One of the teams had Kyle in it with a passed away friend (who looks a emo due to his dark clothes and his expressionless face) and a young raven-haired girl whose onyx eyes shines like a gem while she is hugging both of them with a young woman in her early twenties with long red hair tied to a ponytail. She wore a Konoha flak jacket over a black shirt and black pants. The woman was grinning in the picture and was making a 'peace sign' with her hands. While Kyle's team seems like a well-connected team, the other team was the opposite as there were two pictures of the same team. The two boys, a dark haired yet positive boy with life in his eyes and white-haired expressionless boy with eyes that seen death, were looking away before their teacher, a blond-haired man, forced them to look at the camera in the second picture with the only girl in the team doing a peace sign on each hand with a smile, something that the boys have not have if their presence is irritating the other. Kyle smiles at the picture, remembering the times that tied them together before frowning at the memories of the one who gave his life for others to live and prevented a greater tragedy that would crumble their village, their home, and their family.
He then sees that he has mail, walks to the mailbox, checks it before opening it up. It has a folded-up map, two tickets, and a calling card, and a picture of a raven with a cybernetic eye. Kyle opened up the card as he reads the message, "If you're reading this, this means that it is time to start your mission of finding some things for future. The tickets and the map are your clues for the place that you can use to wrap to other worlds. So good luck!" Conveniently the radio makes public with, "To~night in Dusk City is our annual Hot Wheels extreme speed racetrack in the dark underground of chaos streets. That's right! Chaos streets! The most ruthless and toughest racetracks meant for the best of the craziest as this race is not for the faint of heart thanks to the ones who built this extreme racetrack! And the prizes are worth the dare if you managed to be top three survivors that finish this course, well the ones who didn't get their race vehicles wrecked and smashed by the twisted racetrack of madness, shall get big prizes, so don't miss it." Kyle looks at the radio with a growing grin. "Are you thinking what I am think?" Kairung giggles as Kyle gets some stuff ready for tomorrow before he gets on his bed and reads a book before falling asleep into a dream-less sleep.
Underground at an unknown lab….
The place is things that lurk in the shadows would call home as pipes whistle their songs with a eerie chorus of despair and misery from those who can't fight off the pain of the experiments that will crack their bodies to remake them anew, into beings that never be the same. All for the purpose of the survival of the fittest, not just in strength but in adapting in every single environment event that can be thrown at them. Which is the main reason why most of them broke down easily, mentally or physically. The boss of this lab is remorseless as he cracks his test subjects to limits and beyond what they could handle, which results in broken bodies and minds as he made monsters and cripples in his lab. He was too buried in the past and focused on his goal to even care about the present unless it moves his progress on his goal. Then he orders with a harsh old voice, "Is our… (wheeze) project Adam…(wheeze) going well?"
An assistant stamper in fear of angering the old doctor, "Not y-y-yet s-s-sir Natur." Natur glares coldly at his assistant who feels the air temperature dropping faster than an anvil in the sky as the old doc roars, "What are you waiting for!? Get moving!" The doctor's assistant flees knowing that the elder professor's temper is notorious for making the air temperature drop faster than a hammer's hit. His name fits his Arctic cold exterior and space temped interior as it is Kalte Natur or Cold Nature in his natural born language but nothing else is nature about him even his dark blue ice like eyes hold some secret that keeping him going to his goal as if winter itself made him last longer as his age isn't portrayed by his body nor his movements are not too slow nor too quick like he is an embodiment of a blizzard, freezing everything in his path and leaving everything an frozen ice land in his wake. He is works with an expression-less face carved from ice and stone and if the eyes are windows of the soul, his eyes are the gates of a dark, freezing cold, and lifeless world with no joy nor hope, only sorrow and self-hate remains. And this leaks from his body as it chills the very lab rooms, every single one of them, both flesh and soul.
This is the place where Esther escapes from, a frozen place of darkness and madness, all caused by another madman's plans to create an empire that is forged in the flames of hatred, the very goal that helped to create Europe's WW2. And madness continues to extend the Night of sorrow and grief as the cycle of chaos and hate spins endlessly whenever in the hellish summers or nightmarish winters.
Sticks and stones may break bones, but words hurt the heart and tragedy hurts the most as fear and despair wreaks havoc.
All of humanity's good nature are often tested the most in war and conflict… and often found lacking. For betrayal of the one you trusted most is more painful than you hated with your life.
For that betrayal burns your soul and freezes your heart before it shatters into dust. And it's hard to put together the heart back. Progress will be filled with pain and no relief will come to aid you easily. Not even the purest of souls cannot escape that reality once they walk into its grasp.
In the morning at Kyle's home…
Esther woke up in the guest room on a soft bed as she stretched her legs and arms out with an adorable yawn. Her eyes blink as she gets used to her new situation. She is glad that she has some comfort compared to the cold lab with suffering test subjects. Esther could feel their pain though her new psychic powers, given, no thrusted to her like a artificial limb to her body. The doctor merely installed a new six sense into her, which is a boon yet a curse. However, she ever never gone crazy, she doesn't know. It's like she is unconsciously holding onto a floating raft in a sea of madness and chaos.
Suddenly a delicious smell smacks her nose and wake her up from her thoughts to reality as the young teenage girl walk to the kitchen where Kyle is cooking breakfast which oatmeal with fruits and brown sugar mixed in, a simple meal that tastes fantastic especially when you have not tasted sweet since forever.
She never could remember her past thanks to the experiment wiping her childhood memories clean to use her psychic powers to the fullest, but she has peculiar dreams of someone holding her in their arms before the dream was washed away in flames then encased in ice. Esther has a strong feeling that if she tries to remember her past, it will break her heart badly. Kyle never knew how rough Ester's life really was, but he knows that it is harsh when he sees how nervous she is acting. And then he promises he will be there for her every step of the way. Hoping to create new memories with her to help her live on with her life without fear. Kyle smiled over at Ester. "Hey there, Esther, did you sleep well?" He asked her kindly as he gives her the food which she said yes to his question before eats her food while he gets on the phone with a… eccentric old man raised him when he was a baby. "Yes, I have heard about the tournament old man… What do you mean by…? Oh no, no-no, I am not cleaning up one of your schemes again. Why I am not surprised about that?... Yes, I know that you got the resources… See you later old man." Kyle then turns off the call as he turns to Esther and inquires, "So how is your breakfast?" Esther looks up at him with a smile and answers, "Yes, it is great." Kyle smiles which unknowingly makes Esther's heart flutter. Esther is learning to control her powers, but she has little influence on which minds she can get into as she 'sees' his good intentions and some race with great prize. Kyle's mind gave a her a viewpoint of a place is sunny and warm unlike the cold lab. She sees other memories, but they were mostly a blue because that's cause Kyle's focus isn't on them. One of images that she can clearly see is a old pale-skinned man garbed in black cloak and a grey cameo jacket and pants. His boots is foreign designed as they look like none of the boots she has seen due to the light blue marks on them. Then the images fade as shadows fall on them.
(Lord of the Rings OST: Shadows of the past.)
Then there was a purple light showing images of wicked deeds of a twisted shadow that looks like Kyle, but he seems more… unnatural and evil as his eyes seem to be like purple crystals holding dark black venom, ready to hit its next target to inflict chaos. It feels like this being's actions are the results of his instincts and is part of who he is. Esther has a feeling that he is something that is rarely good to the world at large. Then her theory is proven when the shadow fought against Kyle who is like lighting as they flicker and fight in a dance of war with the world groaning and crumbling around them, unable to hold or have their power nor their battle as reality is ripped to reveal many versions of this battle being fought. The fiery beauty has a feeling that those images show that Kyle and the shadow shall fight with no end in sight as they clash across time and space. Their deeds laid bare in the rips of reality as the shadow conquered many who came in his warpath while Kyle helps others and fought evil in many shapes and sizes. Esther feels her body warm up at the sight of his heroism before shuddering at the shadow like images of the Dark Kyle and his sinful deeds which are obscured in darkness and shadows before she heard his roar rippling through the inky darkness, "Let worlds know my name and fear it! I Am Rökkr! The greatest warlord that these worlds have ever seen! For some it will be last thing they see. Bahahaha!"
Esther then feels the emotions in his wicked and vile laughter as he roars loudly as he marches with an army of monster that look like they have been born in shadows of underworld, no, the underworld of the entire multiverse to war and conquest. No world no matter how pure fall in wakes of a being intent on creating a shadow, a legacy that can never be easily removed in the history of the worlds.
But with Kyle's fair share of history, it's a tale of adventure and hope... but mixed with sorrow and anger as he suffers heartbreak and loss. Flesh, heart, and soul can heal but can never be the same again. Wars and Battles were fought, tearing up everything it could touch. Kyle defended some of the damage from it as he stood his ground in front of an army of black monsters with purple veins flowing in their bodies. Their teeth and claws are sharp and jaded to rip and shred, their eyes seem to be glowing lights of doom as fear washes over her. But still Kyle stood tall and strong as he fought against them either with spells or his blade. None came past him alive as they are the ones being torn and slain by his blade which looks like a beam of lighting connecting the handled with a black dragon head. The blade looks beautiful as lighting dance on it before leaping on the target like a tiger on his prey. But that was a eye appetizer compared to what happens next. Kyle dances with his blade making an eastern dragon from lighting as it destroys any monsters it touches in this wonderful dance. With roars of thunder, most of the dark monsters burn in the wakes of the dragon as Kyle threw it at a thick part of the army as an explosion of lighting wiped them out like an effective wash rag on dirt. But still Kyle fought on though the storm of war as there more to come for in his way is a sea of shifting shadows that seem to look like monsters of many shapes merged somewhat together in a mashup of a monstrosity. Then Esther wakes up along with a question in her mind, 'Who is he really?'
To be continued…