The Gift - Volume #1

The Gift

Blood dripped down from Raito's mouth. His white bodysuit armor filled with rips revealed bruised and bleeding skin. A helmet cracked in half laid by his feet. Sweat dripped from his black hair. His hazel eyes were locked onto his opponent. Across from him stood a man who appeared to not have a single scratch on him, laughed. Raito shouted out, "I may be down, but I'll never forfeit this fight! I rather die trying to defeat you!"

Then a mysterious voice yelled out from above, "You won't have to do this alone!" A man fell out of the sky, wearing the same type of armor as Raito. The man landed on his feet and got into a fighting position, ready to help.

With overwhelming excitement, "Hiro! I thought you were dead!" Yelled Raito.

"We are heroes! When evil is around, justice will be there to stop it! So, until there are no longer villains like Vile, I can never die!" Hiro exclaimed.

Believing Hiro had died, Vile snickered to himself. "You could have lived a normal life and continue to let me believe I had killed you. But now, I'll make sure you stay dead!" Vile then charged at both Raito and Hiro.

Raito and Hiro looked at each other and nodded their heads in agreement. "We will end this with one attack!" They both yelled. Both began to pull their right arm back to gather energy into their fist. "Juuuuuuustice.....punch!!!" They shouted as they threw out their fist towards Vile. A blast of energy had started to head towards Vile and.......

"Raito! You're going to be late for school. Get up, just because you're about to graduate doesn't mean you should start slacking off," said Raito's father while drinking his coffee to start the day. Upon hearing his father's voice, he jumped up only to realize that the entire fight was nothing more but a dream.

"I'm up I'm up!" He shouted as he rubbed his eyes. He looked over to the poster next to him that had a picture of Hiro and Vile. This wasn't the first time Raito had dreamt of fighting alongside his favorite fictional character; he became slightly disappointed knowing none of it was real. Realizing he was cutting it close, he tried to look for clothes to wear. With comics and drawing paper all over the floor, it took longer than it should have to find a pair of clean clothes. As Raito tried to run out of his room, his left foot slipped on a comic book that was left on the floor. He was able to catch himself before falling luckily. "I really need to start organizing my stuff better."

Making his way downstairs, he swung by the kitchen to see his mother sipping her tea and his father switching from bites of toast to swigs of coffee. Raito stopped by his father and picked up his own piece of toast to hold him till he got to school. "I'll eat something at school. Love you," he said to his father with a one-arm hug. He turned to his mother, who was still waking up and kissed her cheek. Still learning to speak Japanese, he tried his best to say goodbye to his mother and to have a good day. With the final goodbyes to his parents, Raito practically shot out the door and ran down the block.

Raito had a passion for creating fantasy stories since he was five when he first saw an action-packed anime that left his little eyes sparkling. From that day forward he had tried to imitate those characters by trying to fight, act, and talk like his childhood heroes on TV and in comic books. Thanks to his mother and relatives in Japan, he was learning how to read and write in Japanese to keep his heritage alive. Funny how something as little as animation and comics can change a whole person's life in an instant.

While at school, Raito tended to daydream about living in a more exciting world. During lectures in class, he would spend most of his time drawing his favorite fictional characters. To improve his drawings, he took several art classes which is where he would practice drawing his own characters.

He had always been a reserved guy when around people but this didn't stop him from making friends at school. The friends he did make were just friends while in school. Outside of school, Raito would lock himself up in his room to continue drawing but also to practice his Japanese. In all honesty, he never really minded being by himself but did grow envious of kids at school that would hang out outside of school. This type of jealousy only grew bigger when he found out his friends were spending time together without inviting him. The only time they would ever invite him is if they needed a ride since he had his own car.