The Gray Son: CH 1 The Grayson Fall

A high pitched, piercing scream broke above the collective gasp of the crowed as the yong couples flight towards each other turned into a deadly decent towards the ground.

For a moment the enire world froze around the small dark haird, blue eyed boy. The last moment his parents were still alive. The moment before they hit the ground and would be gone from his life forever. The hundreds and thousands of moments that followed after would swarm around him. Disorienting and distorted. Just pieces of broken memory he'd try harder to forget rather than remember. The crowd that had stared back at him had become faceless. But he did remember one face. The one face that stuck out out of all the others. He had not understood why he remembered it so well until, one day when he looked in the mirror and that same face was staring back at him. Then he realized, it wasn't the face that he necessarily rememberd so clearly, it was the look on that face. It was a look that had known the same loss that he now knows so well. He often wondered what had happened. How long ago was it when he had lost his whole life? How old was he? What his life must be like now? Has he forgotten? Does he seek revenge? Or does he wallow in his own self-pity in the shadows of the life he used to have before he had lost his parents? Then a long black shadow had cut him off from that face and surrounded him in nothing but darkness for days, weeks, maybe even months for all he knew. Then a light had shown. So bright and so blinding that tears would have formed if he hadn't been so dehydrated. Even when he had squeezed his eyes shut, it didn't help any. He mine as well of not had any eyelids at all.

"Are you hungry?" A Voice seemed to surround every inch of him. It was so clear and poignant he could almost feel the words crawl along his skin.

He didn't answer.

The Voice became demanding. It was neither male or female. Nor was it yong or old. But a collection of everything. "I will ask one more time. And only once more. Are you hungry?"

He tried to speak but had found that he couldn't. So he gave the tiniest nod possible.

"Then you must eat." The smell of cooking meat had suddenly filled the air and his mouth, using whatever liquid had been left inside his body, started to salivate. "Well, if you want it. Come and get it."

He had started to frantically look around but there was still nothing but blinding whiteness. Just when he had given up a shadow formed out of the corner of his eye. When he looked, it was a door. He tried to run towards it as best he could and swong it open to reveal a table with a lone bowl full of steaming hot meat. Before he even consciously knew what he was doing he found his arms were already elbow deep in the meat and shoveling cunks of it into his mouth.

"That's a good boy."

Suddenly he started to choke. He was eating too fast and his throat was too dry due to dehydration. His stomach contracted and he threw up.

"Drink!" The Voice demanded.

With his stomach and throat on fire he suddenly heard the sound of water running to his left. He ran head first into the waterfall that seemed to have appeared out of nowhere. With his eyes closed and mouth wide open he tilted his head up and gulped down as much water as he possibly could. The boy stood there for a long time just letting the cool, smooth water fall on him and soak him to the bone. But just as relief started to rise up inside of him, the memory of his parents lying broken on the floor came crashing down and he crumbled to the ground. The boy lay there long after he started to feel thirsty. He ignored it. He lay there long after he started to feel hungry. He ignored it. Even with the sounds of the water falling and spraying him in the face and the smells of the meat surrounding him. He ignored it.

"Help me." A small hushed voice ecoed in the boys ear.

He opened his eyes without realizing they had been closed and looked around himself without moving his body.

"Help me. Please. Someone. Anyone." The small voice cried.

The young male lifted himself up as the small voice continued to cry. "Hello?"

"NO! PLEASE!" The small voice rose into a scream.

He jumped to his feet and started to run in the direction of the voice. It screamed again and he ran faster. He ran towards a wall and just when he thought he was going to be cut off, the wall on his left opened up and he turned. He ran towards another wall until the one on his right opened. He continued like that for a while with the small voice that got louder and more urgent egging him on. Finally the wall infront of him was gone and once again there was nothing but darkness. Until he noticed a small pool of light that seemed to be in the heart of the blakness. In that light lay a small body writhing on the floor in clear and utter dispare. He ran towards it. once he reached the light he fell to his knees and started to shake the body that was still screaming. Eyes tight shut, arms flying every which way.

"Hay. It's ok. I'm here. I'm here to help you." He cried while trying to avoid getting punched in the face. "Please wake up. Wake up!" Fed up with fighting, he finally pins, what he now realizes is another boy, down using his whole body and slaps the boy as hard as he can in the face. The other boys eyes open wide as he flys up and shoves the dark haird boy off of him.

The dark haird boy gasped loudly. "Raymond!"

The other boy froze in place. Staring wide eyed.

Thats when he had noticed the scratches and scrapes all over the others body.

"Dick?!" He started to laugh and launched himself at the shocked boy and hugged him tightly. "Dick. I can't believe it. What happened to you? After your parents...after they." He stumbled. Seeing his friends face and the memory that was still so clear, he couldn't say the words. "You were there. Right beside them. And than you were gone. Compleatly dissappeared. Hayley and the others. We searched for you for days. We thought you ran away. How did you end up here? Wherever here is." He said looking all around the darkness. Searching for some kind of indicator that might have told him where they were.

"I don't know. You where right. I was there, right next to them. I must have blacked out or something because the next thing I remember is waking up here." Suddenly the small pool of light they were under spreads, getting wider and brighter until it consumed the entire darkness. But somehow the light did not seem as bright or all consuming as before. The smell of cooked meat started to fill Dicks nostrils.

Raymond breathed it in and his stomach started to growl. "Mmmmm! Is it just me hallucinating, or do you smell chicken. No, burgers. Ribs..." He rose to his feet and his old friend rose with him.

"Come on. Got something to show you." Dick led him back the way he had come. For some reason the path seemed a bit different but he couldn't figure out why. They finally got to the room with the waterfall and bowl of meat. It was still steaming hot and fresh. They collided into the waterfall first, bathing and drinking their fill. Once Raymonds thirst was quenched he got another strong whiff of the meat and headed straight for it, whith Dick right on his tail. With each boy on either side of the bowl they reached around eachother for the contents, eating as fast as they where able.

"Dis is be-er den chikin, bur-ers. Be-er den ibbs." Raymond moand around a mouth full of food.

Dick was noding in agreement when suddenly he felt an odd texture against his tongue. Something flat and smooth amongst the chunky, slippery meat. He pulled a peace of fabrick out of his mouth. He wasn't sure but thought he saw hints of yellow and blue. He looked down to see a bigger peace of fabric and picked it up before running up to the waterfall and shoving the two ripped cloths under the water. He washed them out as best he could and held them up to see that the fabrics were in fact yellow and blue. The yellow part looked like it had a design...like wings. Wings of a bird. Like his Flying Grayson costume. Like his parents costume.

"STOP!" He screamed at Raymond and ran as hard as he could towards his friend. With all his strangth he shoved the bowl off the table. It flew towards the ground and landed with a loud crash, breaking into peaces and scattering everywhere. Dick stood up straight and staring intensely into his friends eyes, he showed him the two peaces of fabric. Finally the realization struck and Raymonds eyes went wide.

Dick bent over and proceeded to throw up until he could not possibly throw up anymore. He continued to try anyway. He could hear the sounds of Raymond doing the same.

"Your training is ready to begin." The distinctless voice filled the space around them and the light turned obnoxiously bright-white as before.

Dick could no longer see Raymond beside him but he could hear his screams.

"NO! NO, NOT AGAIN. LEAVE ME ALONE! PLEASE! STOP!"

Dick tried to run but he had no idea where he was going. "Raymond. Raymond, where are you?!" Suddenly something grabbed him. The hold was strong and unforgiving. He would have screamed if it had not knocked the wind out of him. The more he struggled the tighter the clawed hand got until he couldn't breath and he lost consciousness.