The Prince Of Wales

Chapter 1: The Fall (again)

Riley MacLean felt the explosion echo through his body. The mist had protected him from external injuries; however, he had not been saved from internal maladies. This ranged from the emotional and psychological damage caused by the many traumatic events he had gone through, to weakened bones and ligaments.

He felt himself falling through a place of nothingness. He had been in these situations before. Now, he was almost completely unconscious, and, like every prior occurrence of being in this space, Riley could not open his eyes.

The feeling of air hit him with a rush as it always did. He felt a thud that wasn't all that hard as he hit the ground. The place he landed was flat and covered in long grasses or grains. He could tell all of this purely by feeling his surroundings.

He opened his eyes and took in the golden glow of sunset in the grain field. Everything seemed normal here, except for one rut in the ground that caught his eye. It was a dark brown that was most certainly mud.

Riley just barely managed to stand up and walk over to this muddy rut, as it had peaked his curiosity. He was astonished as he noticed something lying in the rut.

What appeared to be a girl in her early teens, unconscious, was lying there. There were several odd things about her appearance, but Riley was too tired to care.

He bent down and attempted to pick her up, but he collapsed due to his extreme exhaustion. As his vision faded to black, he thought he could hear the whir of a helicopter's blades.