The Gift - Volume #1

Don't Fly Away

Friday finally came and Raito had planned out his whole day before he had to leave for the play. He went downstairs to eat breakfast his mom had made.

"Raito, your dad finally got back to me," Raito's mom said in her best English.

Excitedly Raito shouted out, "And what did he say!?"

"He will agree to your plan under two conditions. One, you must get a job while you're not in college. Two, if you haven't earned money from your comic in six months. You had to apply for college."

"Okay, that sounds fair. I can do that."

Raito's fan comic had actually started to pick up some steam. Fans from the I Am Hero loved the idea of expanding the universe with lesser-known heroes from the school. After he had finished his breakfast, he ran back to his room so he could get back to work. He didn't want to just write fanfiction as a way to get noticed and had been working on a new story. Of course, the story had to be about superheroes but he decided to give it something to stand out. The main character was from a comic book that got transported into the real world.

He began drawing all the scenes for the first chapter. Using ideas from comics he had read and thinking about all the different art styled that he loved. It was a good way for him to create his own style to draw in an audience.

The day went by fast and knew he needed to get ready for the play. He wasn't sure if he was supposed to dress casual or fancy for it. He just stared at the two shirts that were in his hands; moving his head back and forth from one shirt to the other. "Dress shirt or t-shirt? Dress shirt or t-shirt? On one hand. I don't have a date so t-shirt. But on the other hand. I'm going to be meeting someone that was in the play, so dress shirt. Ugh! Why is this so hard!?"

He ended up picking a button-up shirt instead.

By the time Raito got to where the play was showing, he was already ten minutes late. "Stupid traffic and no parking spaces," he mumbled angrily to himself. He eventually found his seat and sat down to enjoy the rest of the play. During most of the play, Raito would try and guess who the Gift was. Paying attention to each detail, trying to spot a character whose physical appearance might have been slightly altered. He hardly paid attention to the story at all until he heard this.

"I challenge you to a duel to the death. To restore my family's honor!"

"Finally, some action," Raito whispered.

The rest of the play went by smoothly and Raito actually enjoyed himself once he started to pay attention. He almost left the theater before remembering the whole reason why he even came to the play. He made his way to the backstage, showing his ticket to the security guard, and looked for the dressing room. He eventually found the women's dressing room and got ready to knock on the door before remembering something important, "Flight never told me her real name!"

"How can I ask for someone when the only name I know her by is her Gift name?" He thought to himself.

"Excuse me, are you lost? No one should be back here." A soft voice said.

Raito turned around to see a woman with black hair, green eyes, long legs, and a curvy figure facing him.

"I ummm. Had this VIP ticket," he said holding out the ticket. "I was supposed to meet someone, but my friend forgot to tell me her name."

She took the ticket and began to examine it before having a depressed look on her face. "This ticket wasn't meant for you. I hadn't seen him in a year and was hoping he was watching me out there."

"Flight didn't tell you I was coming?"

The woman shook her head no.

"I can go if you want me too. I didn't mean to make you sad." Raito replied, feeling slight anger towards Flight.