Writings made by the stroke of a fine brush. (Fic)

((This is a Fiction, not an RP. Comments and Reviews Desired. Other input like what is cool accepted. "What if?" Friendly. Overall Friendly.))

A figure sat silent writing, not with a pen or some manner of pencil in a book, the girl wrote with a brush. Her hands where small in size but noticeable callouses where apparent on her palms, fingers and her knuckles, yet they flowed with a simple elegance across the scroll putting down word after word of what she herself had seen, of what she herself was writing.

Her white eyes looked across the page as she wrote, checking each word and letter she put down, making sure as best as she could that her writing was pleasant to the eyes. For her this had meaning, for her she needed it too be something worth reading. This was hard for her, but like everything else in her life she pressed on writing, she had written before in the past. But now, she knew she must write well, for more then her eyes would scrutinize the writings she put down.

The girl listened in the night, her brown hair across her shoulders the wind moving so loud as she tried to think, it didn't annoy her but calmed her, she loved the wind, she loved the out of doors and she loved it.

Her hand moved as she removed the brush from the page, her first strokes done. It was perfect, the text was easy to read, somewhat liner, yet it held a beautiful curve to each letter. Every letter was done to fine detail, each letter was slightly overextended giving the text a shape resemblant too the slight extension of the branches of a tree.

Her hand moved back to the small calligraphy tray that was part of her set that she had taken so long ago and had not used tell now. She rubbed the brush on the palate of the tray cleaning off some of the old ink, She then took the brush and dipped it in the ink giving it a small swirl to even the spread of the ink on the brush. She moved the brush to the trey lightly rubbing the access ink off of her brush and again lifted it taking it towards the page.

Her hand lowered and she began to write anew.

~~~

I write now too tell of what I know. I am a fighter and a wanderer who seeks to know the next part of life and learn about the world. I was not always so, once I was nothing more then a pawn born into a slaves life, a warrior who had no self, I was born a Shinobi.

Far too the north in Japan hidden away northwest of the north most point of Japan lies an island, on that island I was born, trained and raised. It was a cold place more so then most of northern Japan. It's appearance in passing making it appear as just another frozen island covered in high hills and jagged peaks. It was on this Island that I was born and raised.


The clan of the Red Hand; A ruthless and secretive clan of Shinobi who had in secret dedicated themselves for years to the art of stealth and fighting. In this clan you are a follower, you are a soldier, you are a Ninja. What seperates this clan from most of the other clans is that they train in the strangest of abilities, for generations they took the children of those who where mutated, those who showed special abilities, or talents with magic and secretly raised them to fight from an early age.

Those Children had children who where gifted like there parents and then it was decided by the Masters that it was time too selectively breed them for traits such as long life, abilities in stealth or magic. Those born where taken and raised as a member of the clan, they never learn who there parents are and some don't even know who there siblings are, all they are raised to be are Ninja.

My sister and I where born a few years apart, me to follow the story of her birth.

She was born with the eyes of prism, a unique trait only seen once every generation, an eye that could see five spectrum's of light instead of three. It was her place and life to become the Apprentice of the greatest Assassin of the clan, The Dirge Hunter.

I was born four years after her, unlike her I had no gift of that sort, indeed I was, while a high blood of our clan, born without any special ability, no mutation and no extraordinary connection to magic. I was deemed as worth little, a child who learn the ways of the clan and act, but just be one of many because I would never have the cunning of those with the unique mutations or magics of the clan.

I was put under the eye of the combat master Goh'Zhan and from him I learned. He taught me how to walk, how to talk, how to read and write, he taught me of pain as well. The moment I was able to stand on my two feet he started training me to fight, day after day, week after week, I was drilled with the basics of education and the basics of combat.

He then tried to break my will to learn. He took me into a snowstorm and trained relentlessly with me, that would mark the change in my training. The change in who I would become.

He took and drilled me on everything about combat I had learned, forced me too practice while shaking from the cold and at any sign of imperfection he would make me pay dearly, In the first half of the training he broke my arm, and then my other arm, telling how my defenses where flawed, how an opponent would be able to maim me, Despite my arms being broken he did not let up, he continued to make light attacks on me kicking me around the snow forcing me to flee. I was forced to flee for 2 days, I never gave up. I knew he'd probably kill me if I did, he had made that clear. On the second day he managed to catch me and with a single move he broke my legs leaving me laying in the snow. He only said one thing to me, "Survive." and turned and left me laying there.

The island was tiny, and after I recovered from the pain I pulled myself as best I could across the snow to the Dojo. Once there I was greeted by my Master, I expected him to try to farther break me, but in that snow, in that cold, there was no food. Seeing me return he looked satisfied and told me of how this was a lesson to me, that the greatest tool, the greatest weapon, the greatest defense was a Powerful Will. That with it I could learn what others could not.

Soon the training became as brutal as that every single time, Broken arms and legs, crawling on my face to our healers who's special powers had me well the same day only to have them broken the next, over and over again as he taught me how to focus past pain, to think past anguish and how too feel deep down within myself to the Chi.

This continued on tell I was 7 years old, it was my sisters 11th birthday, the time when she would make the ultimate sacrifice and take up the title of Dirge.

~~~

The hand lifted from the page and moved, the girls expression pondering as she remembered the past, her gaze back at her hand her moving the brush too the tray again refreshing her ink.

The smell of the crisp air, the feel of the cool grass and the shine of the almost full moon made her feel truly alive as she wrote, her strokes lightening to a slightly longer more wispy looking form of her handwriting, still as elegant but more relaxed.

~~~

The Dirge Huntress she would be named, and to the God of Sound beneath the island she would sacrifice eyes that could see so beautifully, for ears which could hear deep into another person.

I don't know what happened in there, but the weight on her shoulders was visible even too the least empathic type of person. I had tried to talk her out of it, saying she had such a beautiful gift and that she shouldn't trade it away, she just needed to be strong. But in the end I could not stop her. When she emerged from the cave she had the White Mask of a new Hunter on her face, the mask with no eye holes, but her blood staining the white fabric around her eyes, making her mask, unique.

Goh'Zhan had heard me try to stop her and took me aside and said that I had finally proven myself truly ready and he started to teach me Tai Chi. Kata after Kata, meditations, how too observe balance, and philosophy. He then called me for the first time by a funny sounding name. I wasn't sure what to think. I had never had a name, I was simple there, a Shinobi in training.

As I delved into the Tai Chi he made my training worse and worse, forcing me to dig deeper into myself to find deeper peace inside of combat, forcing me to perform Kata's when I was freezing and in pain and to focus.

It was then I learned how to actual tap my Chi, to train my body using my natural energy that most people don't even know exists inside themselves and how to strengthen myself with it.

Before I knew it blows that hurt a lot I could focus and get past with ease. The amount of weight I could carry increased dramatically, and I could leap strangely far. I trained everything I could. but I remembered my sisters gift and always had envied her eyes. And so I started flowing my chi through my eyes trying to create more pathways for energy.

Goh'Zhan spoke to me and said to me that my eye training was not entirely original, that the training I was performing was an old tradition, and its practitioners where known as ' The Byaku'. I learned why as I trained, I gained rather keen eyes as I trained, enough to see well in all but the darkest of situations. But it had a strange effect, all the coloring in my eye, from the black of the pupil to my Orange Eyes around the pupil had all of there color abolished from them by the increased flow of energy, leaving my eyes totally white.

Time continued on tell I was eleven years of age, my training, My Will and the Tai Chi I had learned had allowed me to become strong enough to go on missions. My first mission was with my master too the City of Paragon, we where to infiltrate and steal some items from around the city.

It went well tell I got separated from Goh'Zhan and found myself faced by two really heavy powered looking mutants. Both of them where really strong I could tell by looking at them, and I knew I had to fight. I tried to fight as best I could but the Rocks that formed the Armoring they called on there body easily deflected all of my attacks. I had not learned enough Tai Chi then to extend it into my attacks, and my small frame made it impossible for me to deal damage, with hand, foot or even weapon. I was driven back and trapped in a closed underpass bridge that had collapsed due to an earthquake earlier that year and had nowhere to run.

I was not however unlucky, as it happened a Hero of Paragon came along, a person who called himself 'Back Yard Boom' came along and attacked the two assailants who where attacking me. I could only watch as he fought taking there blows shrugging them off responding with a raw power like nothing I had ever seen. That was when I changed, I new I had it wrong, all my life I had been trained to sneak and stab from the shadows, too strike when the opponent couldn't see. I knew then that I didn't need all of that. That I could become strong, that I could become like that man and be able to fight seemingly impossible battles without having too slink in some shadow waiting for an opening.

He never knew who I was, but I knew him well. I had been disguised as a Civilian so he didn't notice anything about me. I knew I had too remember what I had learned from him and so I followed him in secret a bit and stole some chains from his workshop.

I found my master later and the rest of our trip went by without event, us returning to the clan.

~~~

The girl with the strange name reached up too her neck feeling the chain on the lower part of her mask, her hand moving up her removing a red band from her own head. She set down the brush a moment untying the knot in the headband she was holding and set it down above the scroll and contemplated it, her remembering her sister and what would be there last meeting.

She looked down and took the quill and started to move it around in the ink gathering more and cleaning her brush with fine strokes taking it back towards the scroll. A small hint of sunlight had peaked over the hill to her east as she began to write again it touching her page.

~~~

I returned to the clan. I felt different somehow, less welcoming like something in it had lost meaning to me. The speeches about this and that drifted past me as water over a stone in the middle of a modest spring. I had become somehow different.

Missions came and went over the month, me never making a mistake in them, me performing beyond most of my peers who had special abilities until on a fateful night I was taken aside by my sister, The Dirge Huntress, We spoke about what we learned and I spoke to her about how I had almost died. She cried for me, I didn't know why so I asked her and she told me that she had heard the true sound of death, the sound that most people can feel the first few times they kill, but grow dull to. that when the Dirge Hunter killed during her training that she had heard death, so close, so horrible, she could hear the pain and suffering as the mans life left his body. She told me how she never wanted it too happen to me, and we made a promise that night.

"I will not kill for my own sake." We both swore this oath, and we both traded items as a sign of our vow, I gave her my clan insignia, and she gave me the band she had used to cover her eye sockets under her mask when her eyes had first been sacrificed. The Red Band I where now is that same band, still red.

That was the last time we ever saw each other, me heading towards my first command mission in Tokyo, her heading another way that I wasn't allowed too know.


In Tokyo I was assigned a mission to steal two important blades, old artifacts from the clans past. The mission at first seemed to go really well until one of my subordinates triggered an alarm, it wasn't long before 5 Heroes showed up. Me and my team decided it was best too make a break for it so we tried. It however did not go that smoothly. We where cut from escape by the five Heroes. I had four Subordinates with me and I knew we matched them evenly and I told that that we where going to stand and fight. They took the blades I handed to them and I stood ready to face the five heroes down.

They however betrayed me and threw Caltrops behind themselves at all of our feet making a break for it, I knew they could have fought them, and I know they knew. Thinking back on it I know why they left, They where 6 or so more years my senior as Ninja, each of them with some ability or another, and yet they where placed under the command of a 12 year old. It doesn't matter anymore, when they left me I left them in spirit. Never would I return to the clan.

The Five Heroes and I did battle, I thought I would be defeated for sure, but I was wrong. While they all had powers they where new to them, one could throw rocks, another could shoot spines, but all of them where one trick heroes, they didn't know how to take advantage of there gifts.

They had lived comfortable lives with there abilities asleep with there families tell one day it awoke in them, where I had never had abilities in the first place and had to literally carve myself my own strength or die.

It wasn't long before all of them where in a heap on the ground, taken out by my new Tai Chi skills which allowed me to press my own chi into there bodies and disrupt there energy. It was still hard as there abilities where still pretty high caliber, even if they didn't know how to use it well yet.

I fled the scene and was in a lengthy chase where I had stolen a vehicle and caused a massive chase, as well as only making it two blocks from the scene because I didn't know how to drive.

It all went seemingly well, the police chasing, me running fighting small groups of them until another Hero showed up, not like the rest, this one was strong, he had awoke his powers along time ago and had been using them for who knows how many years to fight crime.

Before I knew it the battle was over, I was on the ground face first my arms behind me and my hands held behind my back by hands far stronger.

I knew I had come across the worst luck in all of my life looking up at the figure over me, it was none other then Statesman, I had learned about him from the clan. He had been around for the longest of times, longer then most would think and said to be blessed with the power of a great god. And I happened to be in the same city, in the same district, at the same time as him. It felt odd, but when I was captured by him I didn't sense an intent to harm me, he probably didn't even take me seriously, just a strong delinquent kid in his eyes. He took me too the police station, me physically unable to break loose or run.

It came time for my trial and things where to say the least bad for me, I was foolish, my view of the world was opinionated by the strong making the rules. and when I saw the pompous looking judge who looked like he hadn't seen a day of combat in his life I was livid, how could such a pompous man be a judge, he didn't know anything about anything to do with violent legalities after all, he probably hadn't even been in a major scrap before.

As the trial went on I noticed his sneers and jibes at my age, the comments about how I was a angry delinquent who probably had no future without psychiatric help. It went on tell time came for the sentencing as as he about too rule I screamed out that he was a phony know nothing who had no right to rule because he was weak. Then I leaped over the podium I was at and ran leaping into the judge, my hands cuffed behind my back my face slamming into his nose breaking his nose sideways. Before I knew it I was on the street again trying to make a break for it.

As I ran I didn't encounter any problems, except my hands where cuffed, I was dressed like a Prisoner, before I knew it I was once again taken into Custody by the Heroes I had fought for the Swords so long ago... This time it was different, they had learned a few new tricks with there power in light of there loss. I however had my hands cuffed behind my back and was limited to kicking techniques. It was still hard for them, but they managed to overwhelm me and I was taken back to the court room where the Judge made his ruling. I was sentenced as an adult for every crime I had committed, none of them where bad enough to warrant life in prison. But over 30 separate assault charges, museum theft, assaulting an ambassador, assaulting a judge had resulted in a sentence of over 300 years in Zigursky Prison in Paragon because I was too dangerous too just wander, after all I had beat up a team of heroes bad and almost did so again with my hands tied.

A year passed inside that dank prison, a most interesting year. When I first came in they put a Power Restraining device on me which was designed too cut my access too my powers. It didn't work mainly because I don't have a mutation or any sort of 'powers' I control and manipulate the vary energy that keeps me alive, to cut that would be to literally drain me of all life and kill me.

The time there was a rather violent blur, a mix of bad food, people trying to take advantage of me or trying to pity me. It was aggravating at first but I soon learned that there was vary little punishment for getting into a fight and when a large Inmate was trying to take advantage of me I lunged at him and shot my hand like a spear into his gut, piercing partway through his flesh and into his muscle him being carried out to the emergency ward fast. That dead earned me the name "Living Shiv"

After that I was thrown in a more high security vault designed for people who where far more dangerous, like Giant sort mutants or people who had powers that didn't go off. There I met a strange sweet girl a year or so older then me who had been convicted of killing her family, I doubt she did it but all the proof said she not only did it, but she did it in a most gruesome fashion matching her powers.

I got separated from her in the Prison when Arachnos came to bust out some 'chosen ones'.

~~~

The girl looked at her page thinking about what to write next, she looked over seeing that she was out of ink about. The Girl reached into her pack pulling out another bottle of the same ink removing the cap pouring a bit more into the Tray, enough she'd wager to finish her writings.

The strange white eyed girl looked around seeing that it had gone from dawns peak to full morning already. She smiled smelling the small change on the air that was different from when she started.

She took the brush putting it back into the ink preparing the brush again and lowering it back to the page.

~~~

I had found it my debt to Work for Arachnos for providing me once again with my Freedom and I worked hard doing dirty work such as Clearing out Snakes, or blasting out the Local Non aligned thugs, and even to the point where I robbed tow separate banks, the first being my own choice to challenge the security where I had only stole a single dollar as a trophy. This however attracted the attention of the Higher Arachnos Elite, whom hired me to hit another bank as a distraction from one of there other operations in the area, I of course accepted.

I went back into the rages of combat for who knows how long and had breached another vault, leaving the hero whom arrived laying in a heap unconscious, this time taking a 20 dollar bill as a trophy, this time to keep (I bought Pizza and Soda with it).

On my way to report the breach of the Vault on the way back I was stopped and puzzled by a floating card which said “Pocket D VIP GOLD membership” on it, I took the card and disappeared.

It was a strange feeling when I arrived there, the entire place felt out of place, distorted from normal reality, but what I was greeted with was Bizarre, strange rooms, Tiki Masks, and a Strange being who called itself DJ Zero who seemed to have saw fit too turn the place into some sort of freakish club that played the god awfullest crap on repeat day in and day out.
It was there I saw the face of the man who had changed my life so long ago, the man whom I had changed because of my observance of, Back Yard Boom. I greeted him and he didn't know who I was so I told him about the time in Paragon we had met and how he had changed my life then. It was strange talking to him but it felt good so we talked and talked and he convinced me to come to Paragon, he told me that he'd put in word for me on his own reputation and would help me out.

Well I decided to do that, so I took the next sub I could find to Paragon City and turned myself in. I was trialled again and with Boom there and the full legal hearing going without hitch I was sentenced and placed under Booms watch as a sort of Parole arrangement.

It wasn't right however, I loved combat it was all I was ever good at, all I knew. I felt I was living a lie to fight for peace. I knew it was a loosing battle, it would never happen, yet at the same time if it did happen I'd basically render my own life as meaningless. I still don't know rather or not I should have stayed but I don't regret what I did. I turned back and returned to the isles before I got too Entrenched with the Heroes, before I learned there secrets and became embroiled in there own ways.

I remember arriving once again on Mercy Island heading to the Arachnos Fort and in the in the rain revealing who I was again to Kalinda whom had showed me the ropes before, instead of being captured and imprisoned by Arachnos she said to me, “You have returned, and your eyes are no longer the eyes of one lost without direction, as I had told you when I had first met you, ‘I trust your loyalty to Arachnos.’ I can see that you found the loyalty I spoke of.” She had then put me back to work after that, sending me against stronger enemies, giving me battle after battle in the name of Lord Recluse, and my loyalty has remained unaltered, as long as Recluse needs people to fight, I will be ready to fight, as long as he needs a guard I will be ready to protect.

Time continued on and I came to realize the truth about Arachnos, Lord Recluse himself had spoke of them.

I still hold a large loyalty to Arachnos Way, but not in the same manner as a trooper following a leader. There principle is Chaos and those who follow as troopers are not following the vary principles on which Lord Recluse has set forth.

I am loyal to Arachnos' Ways because I am loyal to my own Ambition. I am brutal, I am not afraid to fight for what I believe.

Their are some principle flaws I have found in Arachnos, and all of them are abundantly clear when Lord Recluse speaks.

"You no longer have to work hard to achieve your goals. You can take what you desire." - Lord Recluse

The above line sounds simple to me, take what I want, but the thing is, it's never that simple, to be able to take you must be strong, to be strong you must gain strength, to gain strength you must work your [censored] off for it. Also what you can take can be taken from you.

An example of this is clear in the ownership of corporations' on the isles. Crey Biotech, Aeon Technologies, The Golden Giza, all of them must pay a divide of what they take to lord Recluse or they will be crushed from existence. But then again, his 'divide' is what he is strong enough to take.

"No longer must you bow down to those who deem themselves your superiors." - Lord Recluse

This line took a lot of pondering, a lot of thought, and here is what I drew forth. Arachnos isn't all it seems. Lord Recluse says that you no longer have to bow down. But if you do not bow down to him he will crush you on the spot. At first I summed that he was speaking a Hypocritical line, but I saw the truth, he is not your friend, he has placed himself in a position to control those who don't truly embrace his words.

If I work for Arachnos as a soldier then I will be bowing down to him who has deemed himself my better, and automatically I will not be one of the people who are true to the vision of the future presented by Recluse.

It is a hurdle, a hint given for those who are not just strong of power, but are strong of will too. Too truly live by his Philosophy you cannot act as a loyal subordinate, you must treat him and Arachnos not as a Nation you are loyal too, but as an ambition counter your own. You can work with them, help them and they might help you, but if you bow to them then they will control you. This is the most clever of the control tacts I have seen in my life.

I write now to tell of my past, to write of where I come from, and tell the part of my story that would be left untold. I don't know if you are my enemy or you are my ally, but you now know the path that has formed me. the ways that bind me. And the lesson of my life.

Be strong in all you do. Never give up on what you want. Impossible is a word used by those who have not seen it done yet. Your life is your own, you control it no matter how ingrained against you it started. Your willpower will save you.

I was many things before now. I was never given a choice so I had to make it for myself.

So long ago my master gave my my name, Goh'Zhan said to me when he first called me the name I was given the name I thought was strange "You have found yourself and will never experience true defeat, Hanabi. Your like me, a Xiti, dead without the fires of war."

I am...

Hanabi the Xiti


~~~

The girl Hanabi looks at the end and frowns feeling that the story is somehow incomplete, yet the scroll is filled. Hanabi Frowned as she looked at the scroll. The Ink was still drying she saw, she took the Brush and Tray over to the stream lowering them into it cleaning the remaining ink from them. She looked at the stream as the ink flowed down it quickly disappearing into the endlessly flowing water. She silently mused that life probably was like that.

Hanabi when returned and saw the scroll had finished drying why she had been cleaning out her brush and Ink Tray. Her eyes went down looking at the Text, it was pretty long for a life as short as hers she noted, but still there where so many details missing. So many people left faceless behind the text.

Hanabi rolled the scroll neatly taking it wrapping it with a peace of black cloth and placing it inside of its leather case. Hanabi took the case and put it into her water tight and pressure resistant bag.

She knew then that the story wasn't over...

It was but the Beginning.

Some review please?

I've came across this story not to long ago, and I like to express just how great I think it was as an origin story.

I liked the idea that this character being driven to be the best assassin among a secret order of meta-humans, to stand beyond her peers and rivals despite being only human. It does make sense that a natural hero has to train themselves to the extreme in order to compete against someone who can fly or shot fire.

The written memoir was an effective narrative device to connect all of the events that shaped Hanabi's life. I thought it was pretty effective because, the character's journey to the person she was many years in the making. It points out how a character's background can influence them over the ages, but also that it underlines that one seemingly innocent event can provoke an unexpected development (which is quite common for almost any super hero or villain). I believe, this was the case when Hanabi saw Back Yard Boom in action.

I think the relentless methods which Goh'Zhan used to break Hanabi was well-written. Although I do feel that going through all of this brutal training session is a bit too much for some who is under the age of seven. I got the impression that was a little too extreme, and in mt opinion, I would made her a little older (at least 13 or so) before being put to the test.

Overall, the story was excellent. I really liked how you interrupted Lord Recluse's philosophy.