CHAPTER 2: LANCASTER'S REST

"Not that much longer until I get to the town now." Ikari mutters to himself.

He continues on walking for a few more minutes before he's met with a huge wall blocking the town. He examines the wall, made out of pure concrete, and it reads, "Lancaster's Rest." The boy walks up to the wall and is met with a guard,

"Please halt for a moment sir." The guard says, He approaches Ikari with caution, examining him closely.

"Whats your name, son?" The guard asks.

"Ikari Phoenix." The boy responds, The guard nods and walks back to grab a clipboard, he writes the name down and faces Ikari again.

"Height, weight and date of birth?" The guard continues to ask.

"Is this all necessary?" Ikari asks with clear annoyance in his voice.

"Well, with all of this talk about war upon nations we have to do this." The guard responds coldly.

Ikari sighs.

"Don't know my height, haven't checked my weight, and I'm 16." He responds, not wanting to get into any more fights today.

The guard nods and jots the information down. He approaches the gate and places his open hand on it. The gate opens slowly and makes a creaking noise that echos throughout the town. Ikari puts his hands in his pockets and walks through the gate; he's instantly greeted with a crowded, lively, and chaotic town. He looks around the area; it's filed with peasants begging for money, guards constantly patrolling the area and kids running around.

"This has to be hell..." Ikari says as he sighs deeply. The boy walks to the commercial area, sometimes bumping into people due to the congested area.

He finally gets to the commission board only to find out that that's crowded too, people are pushing each other just to see the board.

"You've got to be kidding me..." He sighs, he continues to watch more and more people pile in to get to the board.

"Yeah, I'll just pass." he thinks to himself. He suddenly senses someone is watching him. He turns around but doesn't see anything out of the ordinary.

"Strange..." He thinks to himself again. He hears his stomach growling even louder then last time.

"I guess I have to resort to plan B.." He mutters to himself. Ikari ducks into an alleyway to avoid the crowds of people and begins walking to the market area. The feeling that someone is watching him returns, he quickly turns around but like last time, no one is there. He shakes his head and continues on.

The rest of the walk is uneventful, he finally arrives to the market area, it's filled with food stands, clothing stores and blacksmiths. Its not as crowded as the commercial area but its still pretty busy. Ikari sticks to the crowd and examines the food stands, one stand captures his eye, he examines it, the stand's name is "Warolbites."

"Weird name..." Ikari thinks to himself, he continues to examine the stand, it has cake, cookies and more deserts. His mouth waters while looking at the food, he quickly shakes his head and focuses again. The boy keeps blending in with the crowd, keeping his eyes on the owner of the stand, waiting for the opportune moment.

As soon as the owner turns around Ikari zips towards the stand and takes a plate of cake and begins to run off.

The owner turns around and yells, "H-Hey you brat get back here!", Ikari was already gone, only trace of him was the small dust particles that he left.

"Dammit..." The owner mumbles.

Ikari continues running until he gets to a secluded alley way. He sits down and begins to greedily eat the cake.

"S-shooo good..." Ikari says aloud, he continues to eat the cake quickly, and in the matter of minutes the cake is completely gone. The boy suddenly regains conscience and clears his throat.

He gets up and begins to walk away, suddenly the feeling of being watched returns to him once again, he turns around and says.

"I know you're there come on out." Ikari commands. No one comes out, but the presence of someone is still there.

"Its a girl, shadow elemental powers, but shes not armed and I don't sense any aggression from her..." Ikari tells himself silently.

Suddenly a figure walks out of the shadows, revealing a girl around his age with blonde hair and light green eyes; she smiles at Ikari.

"Whats your deal?" Ikari says as he crosses his arms.

"What do you mean?" Replies the girl.

"Why have you been watching me?" He says already getting annoyed by the situation.

"You look interesting." The girl says with a smile on her face.

The boy gives her a face of confusion.

"You look like you can help me." Says the girl, the smile on her face fades away as she approaches Ikari.

"I don't help random people." Ikari says coldly.

"My name is Star, now you know me!" The girl says.

"Also let me give you a tip; a search carriage found three bodies and apparently now some guards are looking for you." Star says with a serious tone.

Suddenly, as soon as she finished talking; Ikari senses 30 men all armed with various weapons.

"How did you-" Ikari is cut off by Star who says.

"I know my way around this city, follow me and then we can talk," She begins to run out of the alleyway.

Ikari just stands there in confusion; he snaps back into reality whenever he sees the guards burst through the shadows.

The boy begins to run after Star.

"Stop you bastard!" The chief of the guards yells at the boy.

Ikari continues to follow Star; they duck into multiple alleyways but still can't lose the guards.

"We'll give you to the count of three to stop running before we attack!" Yells the chief.

Star looks around and gets an idea, she begins running towards a building.

"Thats a dead end ahead!" Ikari says to her.

"I know what I'm doing!" she yells back to him.

Star points her palm at the ground and suddenly pitch black shadows in the form of hands form from the ground, she jumps on them all with ease onto a building's roof.

"C'mon hurry!" Star commands him.

"1..." The chief says, Ikari jumps on the first few with ease.

"2..." The chief says louder. The boy jumps onto the last shadow.

"3!" The man yells. The chief points his finger like a gun at Ikari.

"FireBlast!" The man screams as a fireball forms out of his finger and flies at the boy. Ikari jumps onto the roof and turns around and unsheathes his dagger. The fireball edges closer to him he stares at the ball of flame; waiting for the perfect moment.

"Now! CROSS SLASH!" Ikari screams back as his dagger emits a dark red aura, he slashes downwards at the fireball, cutting it in half.

The fire ball explodes, the flames burst out to the left and right of him.

"I-It missed?!" The chief yells in confusion.

Ikari stares at the chief and his men coldly.

"C'mon lets go!" Star says. Ikari levels his dagger at the men as if he wanted to kill them.

Star quickly grips his shoulder.

"I said, we're leaving." Star turns the boy around only to be met with a death stare; but the girl stares back, not intimidated at all.

This surprises Ikari a bit, he deeply sighs and sheathes his dagger, clearly pissed off.

"Follow me!" Star says as she jumps off of the roof and lands safely, Ikari gives one last stare at the men before following suit.

The men stand in disbelief for a moment before the chief sighs and calls off the chase.

Star leads Ikari out of the city and into the forest. The pair continues to flee until they're sure that they lost them.

"Okay we lost them..." Star says while recovering her breath.

"Nice clean getaway you had planned." Ikari says sarcastically.

"Hey, we're still alive are we not?" the girl says with a smile.

Ikari sways his head in disproval before Star approaches him with a serious tone.

"Now, you owe me one." she says.

He stares at her coldly.

"Why did you do that?" He asks her.

"I felt like you could help me with something." She replies.

"Yeah but what is this something?" He says with annoyance in his voice.

"First, tell me your name." Star says.

Ikari sighs and replies, "Ikari Phoenix."

"I knew it, The lone survivor himself!" She says with a smile.

Ikari looks at her with an unimpressed look.

"Okay, I want you to take me on an adventure." She says with a serious tone.

"You have to be joking." Ikari says with no sort of emotion on his face.

"I have my own mission too you know." He replies.

"Well, its not just any adventure..." She says, she looks down and continues.

"Its so I can maybe regain my memories, so maybe I can find out something about my parents and who I am..." Star says sadly.

"One day I just woke up in the middle of no where, No sort of memories or no trace of family..." She looks up at him.

"So please try to help me!" She yells in desperation.

"Sorry, no deal." He says coldly.

"W-what?!" Star says, clearly surprised.

"I already said that I have my own mission." Ikari says, he turns around and begins to walk away.

"W-wait!" Star says while running after him.

"What exactly is this mission?" Star asks.

"Its none of your business." He replies.

"W-well, if you won't tell me, I'll just follow you around until you do!" She yells in frustration.

"It's gonna be a long night..." Ikari thinks to himself. He sighs as he begins his walk home, Star running right after him still yelling at him.

The walk was uneventful, well unless you count Star's shouting. Suddenly the smell of smoke hits Ikari.

"Huh?" He says quietly. At this point he was right next to his house.

He begins to run towards his residence.

"H-hey where are you goi-" She gets cut off whenever she smells the smoke, she understands the situation and follows the boy.

The smell of smoke gets more pungent and stronger the closer they get to the house.

Finally, he arrives at his house. Only to be met with it completely engulfed in flames... He stares at the scene silently; Star quickly arrives next to him.

"Is that your-..." Once again Star gets cut off, but this time, by Ikari.

"Yes, that's my house." He says. She looks at him.

Ikari continues to look at the house, everything he possessed, heirlooms, pictures, clothes, just everything, everything is now gone.

The boy walks closer to the burning house and examines the scene.

"This was definitely executed by people, and I can probably guess who." Ikari thinks to himself.

He continues to examine the scene while Star merely observes him, not knowing what to say.

"Must of been someone their close to..." Ikari says aloud.

"What?" Star says in pure confusion.

"You know how the guards said i killed those three men?" Ikari asks; the girl nods.

"Well I was the one who killed them, and clearly someone came to get revenge." The boy says, getting more and more pissed off at the thought of it.

"Wait you actually killed th-" Star sighs as she gets cut off again.

"Yep, same scent too, it must of been their friends or family." He says, he walks back to examine his house once more.

"Im sorry Ikari..." the girl says, Ikari doesn't respond, after a minute of silence Star speaks up.

"Well what now?" She asks.

"Now? Now, its time I end these bastards." Ikari says with pure rage in his voice.