Post by Mantis on Jan 7, 2007 12:39:58 GMT -5
Taken Name: Mantis
Real Name: Forgotten
Age: Exact age forgotten. Around 19
Nationality: American
Heritage: Forgotten. Seemingly Irish and Italian.
Height: 5’11”
Weight: 180 lbs.
Hair color: Blonde
Eye Color: Green with hazel.
Orientation: Straight
Religion: Atheism
Occupation: Apprentice insect manipulator.
Appearance: similar to this, only with different clothing.
Physical appearance: Fairly built, but not huge. Long blonde hair, usually slicked back. Thin face. Determined looking brow. Generally a lost, solemn look in his eyes.
Clothing: Dark blue jeans, slightly baggy. Black leather belt. Black T-shirt, baggy. An extra large fits him, he wears a 2X. Shirt generally tucked into pants. Dark tan suede trench-coat. Black sneakers, or black steel toe boots.
Personality: Generally Mantis doesn’t speak with any one and is seemingly cold. He can be quite the opposite with those he’s close to however, such as the girl he’d ‘adopted’. Toward her he is very tender and caring. Toward most, he’s generally unfriendly, but isn’t rude, oddly enough. He is very loyal and will fight to the death for someone he cares for.
Style:
Physical style: He usually tries not to fight hand to hand, but when he does, he uses something similar to the Mantis Shaolin style and a style he himself made: Hercules’ Guard. Mantis learned ‘mantis style’ from Mark, an old man in his forties who took care of Mantis after he found himself wandering out alone, but made up ‘Hercules’ Guard’ himself.
Mantis: A quick and relatively strong style that utilizes more open hand strikes than punches. (no it is not where he got his name, though that gave me the idea to have the style.)
Stance: Leg away from opponent is bent, foot pointing away. Leg toward the opponent is almost straight, slightly bent so its not hyper extended if struck, foot pointed directly ahead. Leaning away, obviously enough. Arm (same side as the forward leg) close to the body, as though in a boxing guard position. Opposite arm, slightly out to the side, but similar to the guarding arm. Hands angled down as praying mantis claws.
Hercules’ Guard: A close contact style, derived from the head to head chargings of a Hercules beetle. It’s a physically sturdy style that utilizes power and grappling coupled with slower, more powerful attacks. Think combat Taichi. Generally for protecting others.
Stance: Tight stance, similar foot-work to Mantis style, forward foot pulled back more. Hands balled into fists, hand away is up in a boxers style guard. Hand closer to the opponent is down, upper arm prominent, elbow bent so the fist ends up near the opposite hip.
Magic style:
Psychism: mainly to control the bugs he uses.
Bug manipulation: Mantis uses his Psychism to call and command his bugs. It uses virtually no mana to communicate with the bugs, but it does take mana to control them.
Elementalism: Almost strictly Air and water. (will go into earth and possibly fire as well.)
Summoning: (part of bug manipulation in spell sheet.) Mantis can summon unnatural bugs, such as giant spiders or other creepy crawlies, and even a type of beetle that is elementally immune to fire.
Strengths: Relatively strong and smart. Has a natural resistance to Psychism style attacks. That resistance is transferred to the bugs he controls, but only while he controls them.
Weaknesses: Mantis himself has no real weaknesses other than generally low physical speed (don’t misunderstand he’s not super human, just has no specific weaknesses). Another weakness is the little girl with him, target her and he will defend. Be careful though, for harming her means your death. His bugs, except for those specifically immune, are fatally vulnerable to fire.
Pets/Familiars/Companions: No pets, Familiars are just the bugs he summons/finds, and his companion is a small girl, around Eight years old. (see stat sheet for her bio)
Themes:
Until the End- by Breaking Benjamin
Weapons/gear:
Reinforced Titanium Wakizashi: A simple enough full tang blade, just for all around fighting purposes.
Throwing knives: Two different types:
Dube' Throwing knives: 12 in number, used for causing specific wounds, extremely sharp, simple titanium alloy.
Colt throwing knives: 7 in number. Bigger and broader than the other type, cause more penitrating damage, can reach to the internal organs. Also a simple titanium alloy, nothing reinforced about them.
Weapons pouch: This is where Mantis holds his blades, inside the blades are held in their own slots for easy access.
Fighter's gloves: Black fingerless gloves that are more or less typical fighters gloves, only they have small steel studs that add impact power and a small ammount of weight.
History: Mantis was born in colorado under the name, James Bishop. He was an only child, and lived with both his parents. Normal life, typical little kid who liked to play with bugs. Only, as things went on, the bugs he played with, seemed to like him a little too much. When one day the boy of five walked into his house from the backyard, literally covered in bugs from gnats, to hornets, to spiders, to cocaroaches, both his parents freaked.
After a few minutes, they managed to get all the bugs off of their tiny son, who was laughing the whole time, loving the attention and the panicked movement. He was a little dis-heartened when most of the bugs ended up squashed into the kitchen floor, but he was just a little kid and it didn't really phase him. When it happened again, just days later, his parents began to get worried and called someone.
The man that showed up was more or less your typical shrink, old guy with a beard, glasses, breifcase. He did your basic psych exam on the boy and showed him to be completely normal other than the abnormal interest in animals of the creepy crawly persuasion. The man left and life went on. After a few more episodes of insectiod invasion, the boys parents began to get seriously worried. No one understod what was going on, least of all James.
At about six, the boy ended up pulling a swarm of various bugs into his kindergarden class and had the whole school evacuated and fumigated. That incident was about the tear of it for his parents, who then called in a few different experts, even a psychic. What the doctors couldn't tell the Bishops, was what the psychic could. The woman said that the boy had a very powerful psychic aura about him before convulsing on the floor and passing out.
His parents became extremely worried at this and went to have the boy put into a childrens mental ward. (real nice parents huh?) When the preverbial men in white came to pick James up, he realized that he was being taken away and began to scream. The cry was earsplitting, even without the psychic energy being exuded from the boy. The men began to drag him out the door and the scream intensified, shooting out pulses of mental energy intense enough that it made the two men and James' parents ears literally bleed.
The cry also called thousands upon thousands of his little friends, the bugs. The house became infested with spiders, bees, flys, you name it, they burst into the house from every possible nook and crany to come to the boys aid. Now normally, a few bug bites won't do you any harm, but thousands of tiny little fangs, burrowing into your flesh were enough to kill most any thing.
All four of the adults in the house were quickly silenced by the army of bugs, and the boy's cry stopped. Tears were long since streaming down his face from his green and hazel eyes as he slowly made his way over to the corpses. A good portion of the flesh had been eaten off and the boy couldn't comprehend what he was seeing. Several bugs were crawling on him harmlessly as they usually did as the young boy stumbled out of his house.
To skip some of the details, James, as he still vaguely remembered himself thus far, ended up in the circulation of the child services. He was now eight, though he didn't really know how old he was from being so young when his parents died, and never really having any one to tell him things like his age and birthday on a constant basis. His file was labeled as that his parents died as a result of a freak accident, involving a swarm of bugs and some sound wave that supposedly came from a radio and attracted them, but no definite cause of the swarm was ever determined.
The first home he'd ended up in, he was intirely secluded. It was a nice enough couple that had taken him in, but he'd been traumatized by the events that took him from his original home and he never spoke to them. The only companionship he found was in the bugs that lived in the house, he was able to communicate with the bugs, and though they were generally dumb as rocks, they provided some minute company for the small boy.
After that home gave up hope on him, the boy was back in the cycle of adoption. The next few families ended up in just as much dissaster, a few times the bug manipulator even called a swarm of bugs into the home and scared the people he'd been adopted by out of their own houses.
Some time later, he simply ran away from another home, and was never found, not that there was much effort in his search. Slowly but surely, the boy forgot who he was, and was in utter isolation from more or less all of humanity. Somewhere along the endless journey of survival, the bug manipulator found himself at the home of some strange man who seemed to be in his forties. "Hey kid. Get out of here." He said to the small boy, who was half asleep on the porch of the mans home.
When he looked up, the utter desolately solemn look in the boys eyes triggered something in the man. "Wheres your parents kid?" He asked, now curious as to why there was a little kid, no more than ten years old on his porch. The seemingly dead stare of the boys green eyes lessened as his brain mulled over the words, trying to retain their meaning from a language long forgotten with dis-use. He slowly shook his head, and stared at the man, in a half prone, half asleep position.
"Hmph...Well, may as well come in and get something to eat.....Come on then." The gruff voice said as the relatively thin man turned to go back into his domicile. The boy slid off the bench he'd been laying on and slowly followed the man in the open door, not knowing, or caring of any danger in the action.
"Whats your name boy?" The man asked when his guest came into the kitchen. The boy shrugged lightly, and sat at the table indicated by a wave of the hand from the old man. "What, can't you talk?" He demanded. The boy opened his mouth and strained his voice box to produce some sound from the long disused organ. "I...I don't have a name...I..forgot." Came the small, slightly shaky voice.
The man stopped what he was doing, and turned around. "Forgot? What do you mean you forgot?" His tone softening slightly. "I...forgot...my..name." The boy said, quietly. The man sighed and went back to what he was doing.
After a few minutes, he grumbled with the clicker to light the gas stove and tossed it aside. Then he said something in a low voice "Burn." and the flame lit. "About time." He grumbled, and went back to cooking. A few moments later, the boy asked, "What...was that...you just did?"
"Don't worry about it kid. I guess that'll have to do, I'm not exactly good with naming things." The old man uttered. First part to his guest, second part in a low voice to himself. Another few minutes, and the man grumbled a 'here', shoving a plate of bacon and eggs infront of the boy with a fork. "What? Forgot how to eat to?" He asked at the boys hesitation.
The bug manipulator shook his head, and slowly picked up the fork and began to eat. After he finished, the man took the plate and washed it. He grumbled again at a spider on the counter and went to smash it with an old magazine. "WAIT!" The boy shouted and ran over to the counter. "What kid? It's just a damn bug." He said, stopping mid swing. The boy shook his head and put a hand infront of the small spider, comforting it mentally as he'd grown acustomed to being able to, and picked it up.
He put it outside and went back to the old man. "Hmph...Like bugs that much kid?" He asked, and the boy shrugged, "Bugs have always been my friends...I always look after them." He responded, his voice not as meek as before, now becoming used to speaking again. The old man gave another 'Hmph' and returned to the dishes. The nameless, blonde boy sat back down and waited until the man finished and sat opposite him. "So I take it from you being on my porch, and looking how you do, you got no where to go huh kid?" He said, stating the obvious. He then said, "Well...You can stay here if you want, not like I don't got the room, small as this place seems. Names Mark."
They made small talk for a while, generally where the blonde boy came from. He didn't know, and most of the questions asked to him were or could be answered by shrugs. Finally "Well...If your gonna stay here, go wash up. Don't want a dirty little kid running around here. There are some clothes in the room across from the bathroom that should fit you." And he gave the directions of 'up the stairs, second door on the left' as to where the bathroom was.
After the boy was clean and dressed, he went back downstairs and sat in the same chair in the kitchen to find the old man, now known as Mark, flipping through the magazine that would have been that spiders demise. "Much better...At least your not dirty any more." Mark said with a rather dull expression.
"Why do you have kid clothes?" The boy asked after a few minutes, not acustomed to speaking or being spoken to, so it was a simple question with nothing behind it. "I had a kid once...Died a year ago though." Mark said after a pause. "Oh." Was the simple response. "About your age too...How old are you any way? Or do you not remember that either?" He said, and asked. The blonde boy shook his head, and the topic was dropped.
The two lived together normally for a few months. As time progressed, the boy, who eventually began to call himself 'Mantis' for an insect he admired, began to wander around. Children that lived in the area around the town that was about half a mile away, began to pick on the small blonde boy for treating bugs as friends. Eventually one day, the boy was backed into a corner, and called the bugs to help. There was one death and another boy lost use of his right arm from nerve damage. After that, Mark, who knew of the boys bug manipulation and was strangely unphased by it, revealed something about himself.
"Kid...You can't rely on those bugs to help you, they're too dangerous. One of those boys was killed by your bugs. You understand?" He said, then at the solemn nod of the head from 'Mantis' "Look. I'll teach you some self defense. One thing you'd never guess about me is that I was a martial artist back in the day. Mantis Shaolin style was my favorite. Don't know why, something about it made it seem like there was something more to it, it was balanced, fast, strong. Never mind that, I'm rambling. Come on."
With that, Mark began teaching his permanant guest martial arts. The style was perfect for the boy, as he'd already dubbed himself 'Mantis' just to give people something to call him beisides kid. As time went on, Mantis learned the mantis style and people began to think that, that was why he was called 'Mantis', a natural enough assumption.
Four years after the small blonde boy came to the stoop of the martial artist, and to be revealed, Element Mage, Mantis was a seasoned martial artist, bug manipulator, and element mage. He'd only taken to air and water magic, but they were still elements. He didn't talk much, and stayed secluded aside for a couple of people in town who loved bugs, Mark, and of course, the bugs themselves.
Mantis was walking an old beaten path near the mountains where there were actually trees when there was the sound of relatively light, but rapid foot steps. A scream was heard as a small girl stumbled out of the trees, a mountain lion slowly walking right behind her. A mental command sent a swarm of insects to converge on the predetor as the girl ran head long into Mantis' arms. He had to crouch down to grasp her as she couldn't be more than five or six years old. The lion swatted and growled at the large ammount of bugs that surrounded it, and was beaten off by repeated bites and stings on its muzzle, eyes, and where the fur was thin.
The girl was crying and relieved to be in the arms of another human being. "Whats the matter? Where are your parents?" He asked in his moderately pitched voice, it wasn't deep, but it wasn't high either. Past the sobbing, the girl managed "I don't know. I was playing with my dolls and then I was in the woods." Though it was botched through the sniffling and crying. Mantis picked her up and dismissed the insects that came to his aid from within the woods.
The boy, who was probably about fourteen or fifteen, took her back to the house and explained what had happened to Mark. "Little girl, where are you from?" He asked in an unusually soft tone. "I don't know..." But she spoke with a seemingly british or australian accent.
From that day on another person was added to the house, and treated as one of the 'family', with Mark as the father, Mantis the son, and the small girl, whose name was Julie, as the daughter. A botched family of people who had nothing to do with one another, but that was alright, they still got along and took care of one another. Mantis kept training, and Julie just played around with the bugs that her 'brother' called up, mostly butterflies and such.
They eventually realized what had brough the small girl to them, she had the ability to teleport. She couldn't do it very many times, but if she wanted to she could have been to china and back in an instant. She had no idea where she lived however, being so young, and couldn't go back to where ever it was she'd come from.
Finally, another few years after the girl had appeared in the woods, Mark brought up something about Mantis' magic, "Theres a school...for magic users. It's called Arcane Academy....I think you should take Julie and sign up, they can teach you alot more about your magic than I can, and you can become stronger."
The blonde young man was probably around twenty, he still didn't remember how old he was, and the girl with the same hair color was eight or so. They left the old house and the closest thing to a father they'd had in years, and made their way to Babylos, the massive floating island in the sky.
Real Name: Forgotten
Age: Exact age forgotten. Around 19
Nationality: American
Heritage: Forgotten. Seemingly Irish and Italian.
Height: 5’11”
Weight: 180 lbs.
Hair color: Blonde
Eye Color: Green with hazel.
Orientation: Straight
Religion: Atheism
Occupation: Apprentice insect manipulator.
Appearance: similar to this, only with different clothing.
Physical appearance: Fairly built, but not huge. Long blonde hair, usually slicked back. Thin face. Determined looking brow. Generally a lost, solemn look in his eyes.
Clothing: Dark blue jeans, slightly baggy. Black leather belt. Black T-shirt, baggy. An extra large fits him, he wears a 2X. Shirt generally tucked into pants. Dark tan suede trench-coat. Black sneakers, or black steel toe boots.
Personality: Generally Mantis doesn’t speak with any one and is seemingly cold. He can be quite the opposite with those he’s close to however, such as the girl he’d ‘adopted’. Toward her he is very tender and caring. Toward most, he’s generally unfriendly, but isn’t rude, oddly enough. He is very loyal and will fight to the death for someone he cares for.
Style:
Physical style: He usually tries not to fight hand to hand, but when he does, he uses something similar to the Mantis Shaolin style and a style he himself made: Hercules’ Guard. Mantis learned ‘mantis style’ from Mark, an old man in his forties who took care of Mantis after he found himself wandering out alone, but made up ‘Hercules’ Guard’ himself.
Mantis: A quick and relatively strong style that utilizes more open hand strikes than punches. (no it is not where he got his name, though that gave me the idea to have the style.)
Stance: Leg away from opponent is bent, foot pointing away. Leg toward the opponent is almost straight, slightly bent so its not hyper extended if struck, foot pointed directly ahead. Leaning away, obviously enough. Arm (same side as the forward leg) close to the body, as though in a boxing guard position. Opposite arm, slightly out to the side, but similar to the guarding arm. Hands angled down as praying mantis claws.
Hercules’ Guard: A close contact style, derived from the head to head chargings of a Hercules beetle. It’s a physically sturdy style that utilizes power and grappling coupled with slower, more powerful attacks. Think combat Taichi. Generally for protecting others.
Stance: Tight stance, similar foot-work to Mantis style, forward foot pulled back more. Hands balled into fists, hand away is up in a boxers style guard. Hand closer to the opponent is down, upper arm prominent, elbow bent so the fist ends up near the opposite hip.
Magic style:
Psychism: mainly to control the bugs he uses.
Bug manipulation: Mantis uses his Psychism to call and command his bugs. It uses virtually no mana to communicate with the bugs, but it does take mana to control them.
Elementalism: Almost strictly Air and water. (will go into earth and possibly fire as well.)
Summoning: (part of bug manipulation in spell sheet.) Mantis can summon unnatural bugs, such as giant spiders or other creepy crawlies, and even a type of beetle that is elementally immune to fire.
Strengths: Relatively strong and smart. Has a natural resistance to Psychism style attacks. That resistance is transferred to the bugs he controls, but only while he controls them.
Weaknesses: Mantis himself has no real weaknesses other than generally low physical speed (don’t misunderstand he’s not super human, just has no specific weaknesses). Another weakness is the little girl with him, target her and he will defend. Be careful though, for harming her means your death. His bugs, except for those specifically immune, are fatally vulnerable to fire.
Pets/Familiars/Companions: No pets, Familiars are just the bugs he summons/finds, and his companion is a small girl, around Eight years old. (see stat sheet for her bio)
Themes:
Until the End- by Breaking Benjamin
Weapons/gear:
Reinforced Titanium Wakizashi: A simple enough full tang blade, just for all around fighting purposes.
Throwing knives: Two different types:
Dube' Throwing knives: 12 in number, used for causing specific wounds, extremely sharp, simple titanium alloy.
Colt throwing knives: 7 in number. Bigger and broader than the other type, cause more penitrating damage, can reach to the internal organs. Also a simple titanium alloy, nothing reinforced about them.
Weapons pouch: This is where Mantis holds his blades, inside the blades are held in their own slots for easy access.
Fighter's gloves: Black fingerless gloves that are more or less typical fighters gloves, only they have small steel studs that add impact power and a small ammount of weight.
History: Mantis was born in colorado under the name, James Bishop. He was an only child, and lived with both his parents. Normal life, typical little kid who liked to play with bugs. Only, as things went on, the bugs he played with, seemed to like him a little too much. When one day the boy of five walked into his house from the backyard, literally covered in bugs from gnats, to hornets, to spiders, to cocaroaches, both his parents freaked.
After a few minutes, they managed to get all the bugs off of their tiny son, who was laughing the whole time, loving the attention and the panicked movement. He was a little dis-heartened when most of the bugs ended up squashed into the kitchen floor, but he was just a little kid and it didn't really phase him. When it happened again, just days later, his parents began to get worried and called someone.
The man that showed up was more or less your typical shrink, old guy with a beard, glasses, breifcase. He did your basic psych exam on the boy and showed him to be completely normal other than the abnormal interest in animals of the creepy crawly persuasion. The man left and life went on. After a few more episodes of insectiod invasion, the boys parents began to get seriously worried. No one understod what was going on, least of all James.
At about six, the boy ended up pulling a swarm of various bugs into his kindergarden class and had the whole school evacuated and fumigated. That incident was about the tear of it for his parents, who then called in a few different experts, even a psychic. What the doctors couldn't tell the Bishops, was what the psychic could. The woman said that the boy had a very powerful psychic aura about him before convulsing on the floor and passing out.
His parents became extremely worried at this and went to have the boy put into a childrens mental ward. (real nice parents huh?) When the preverbial men in white came to pick James up, he realized that he was being taken away and began to scream. The cry was earsplitting, even without the psychic energy being exuded from the boy. The men began to drag him out the door and the scream intensified, shooting out pulses of mental energy intense enough that it made the two men and James' parents ears literally bleed.
The cry also called thousands upon thousands of his little friends, the bugs. The house became infested with spiders, bees, flys, you name it, they burst into the house from every possible nook and crany to come to the boys aid. Now normally, a few bug bites won't do you any harm, but thousands of tiny little fangs, burrowing into your flesh were enough to kill most any thing.
All four of the adults in the house were quickly silenced by the army of bugs, and the boy's cry stopped. Tears were long since streaming down his face from his green and hazel eyes as he slowly made his way over to the corpses. A good portion of the flesh had been eaten off and the boy couldn't comprehend what he was seeing. Several bugs were crawling on him harmlessly as they usually did as the young boy stumbled out of his house.
To skip some of the details, James, as he still vaguely remembered himself thus far, ended up in the circulation of the child services. He was now eight, though he didn't really know how old he was from being so young when his parents died, and never really having any one to tell him things like his age and birthday on a constant basis. His file was labeled as that his parents died as a result of a freak accident, involving a swarm of bugs and some sound wave that supposedly came from a radio and attracted them, but no definite cause of the swarm was ever determined.
The first home he'd ended up in, he was intirely secluded. It was a nice enough couple that had taken him in, but he'd been traumatized by the events that took him from his original home and he never spoke to them. The only companionship he found was in the bugs that lived in the house, he was able to communicate with the bugs, and though they were generally dumb as rocks, they provided some minute company for the small boy.
After that home gave up hope on him, the boy was back in the cycle of adoption. The next few families ended up in just as much dissaster, a few times the bug manipulator even called a swarm of bugs into the home and scared the people he'd been adopted by out of their own houses.
Some time later, he simply ran away from another home, and was never found, not that there was much effort in his search. Slowly but surely, the boy forgot who he was, and was in utter isolation from more or less all of humanity. Somewhere along the endless journey of survival, the bug manipulator found himself at the home of some strange man who seemed to be in his forties. "Hey kid. Get out of here." He said to the small boy, who was half asleep on the porch of the mans home.
When he looked up, the utter desolately solemn look in the boys eyes triggered something in the man. "Wheres your parents kid?" He asked, now curious as to why there was a little kid, no more than ten years old on his porch. The seemingly dead stare of the boys green eyes lessened as his brain mulled over the words, trying to retain their meaning from a language long forgotten with dis-use. He slowly shook his head, and stared at the man, in a half prone, half asleep position.
"Hmph...Well, may as well come in and get something to eat.....Come on then." The gruff voice said as the relatively thin man turned to go back into his domicile. The boy slid off the bench he'd been laying on and slowly followed the man in the open door, not knowing, or caring of any danger in the action.
"Whats your name boy?" The man asked when his guest came into the kitchen. The boy shrugged lightly, and sat at the table indicated by a wave of the hand from the old man. "What, can't you talk?" He demanded. The boy opened his mouth and strained his voice box to produce some sound from the long disused organ. "I...I don't have a name...I..forgot." Came the small, slightly shaky voice.
The man stopped what he was doing, and turned around. "Forgot? What do you mean you forgot?" His tone softening slightly. "I...forgot...my..name." The boy said, quietly. The man sighed and went back to what he was doing.
After a few minutes, he grumbled with the clicker to light the gas stove and tossed it aside. Then he said something in a low voice "Burn." and the flame lit. "About time." He grumbled, and went back to cooking. A few moments later, the boy asked, "What...was that...you just did?"
"Don't worry about it kid. I guess that'll have to do, I'm not exactly good with naming things." The old man uttered. First part to his guest, second part in a low voice to himself. Another few minutes, and the man grumbled a 'here', shoving a plate of bacon and eggs infront of the boy with a fork. "What? Forgot how to eat to?" He asked at the boys hesitation.
The bug manipulator shook his head, and slowly picked up the fork and began to eat. After he finished, the man took the plate and washed it. He grumbled again at a spider on the counter and went to smash it with an old magazine. "WAIT!" The boy shouted and ran over to the counter. "What kid? It's just a damn bug." He said, stopping mid swing. The boy shook his head and put a hand infront of the small spider, comforting it mentally as he'd grown acustomed to being able to, and picked it up.
He put it outside and went back to the old man. "Hmph...Like bugs that much kid?" He asked, and the boy shrugged, "Bugs have always been my friends...I always look after them." He responded, his voice not as meek as before, now becoming used to speaking again. The old man gave another 'Hmph' and returned to the dishes. The nameless, blonde boy sat back down and waited until the man finished and sat opposite him. "So I take it from you being on my porch, and looking how you do, you got no where to go huh kid?" He said, stating the obvious. He then said, "Well...You can stay here if you want, not like I don't got the room, small as this place seems. Names Mark."
They made small talk for a while, generally where the blonde boy came from. He didn't know, and most of the questions asked to him were or could be answered by shrugs. Finally "Well...If your gonna stay here, go wash up. Don't want a dirty little kid running around here. There are some clothes in the room across from the bathroom that should fit you." And he gave the directions of 'up the stairs, second door on the left' as to where the bathroom was.
After the boy was clean and dressed, he went back downstairs and sat in the same chair in the kitchen to find the old man, now known as Mark, flipping through the magazine that would have been that spiders demise. "Much better...At least your not dirty any more." Mark said with a rather dull expression.
"Why do you have kid clothes?" The boy asked after a few minutes, not acustomed to speaking or being spoken to, so it was a simple question with nothing behind it. "I had a kid once...Died a year ago though." Mark said after a pause. "Oh." Was the simple response. "About your age too...How old are you any way? Or do you not remember that either?" He said, and asked. The blonde boy shook his head, and the topic was dropped.
The two lived together normally for a few months. As time progressed, the boy, who eventually began to call himself 'Mantis' for an insect he admired, began to wander around. Children that lived in the area around the town that was about half a mile away, began to pick on the small blonde boy for treating bugs as friends. Eventually one day, the boy was backed into a corner, and called the bugs to help. There was one death and another boy lost use of his right arm from nerve damage. After that, Mark, who knew of the boys bug manipulation and was strangely unphased by it, revealed something about himself.
"Kid...You can't rely on those bugs to help you, they're too dangerous. One of those boys was killed by your bugs. You understand?" He said, then at the solemn nod of the head from 'Mantis' "Look. I'll teach you some self defense. One thing you'd never guess about me is that I was a martial artist back in the day. Mantis Shaolin style was my favorite. Don't know why, something about it made it seem like there was something more to it, it was balanced, fast, strong. Never mind that, I'm rambling. Come on."
With that, Mark began teaching his permanant guest martial arts. The style was perfect for the boy, as he'd already dubbed himself 'Mantis' just to give people something to call him beisides kid. As time went on, Mantis learned the mantis style and people began to think that, that was why he was called 'Mantis', a natural enough assumption.
Four years after the small blonde boy came to the stoop of the martial artist, and to be revealed, Element Mage, Mantis was a seasoned martial artist, bug manipulator, and element mage. He'd only taken to air and water magic, but they were still elements. He didn't talk much, and stayed secluded aside for a couple of people in town who loved bugs, Mark, and of course, the bugs themselves.
Mantis was walking an old beaten path near the mountains where there were actually trees when there was the sound of relatively light, but rapid foot steps. A scream was heard as a small girl stumbled out of the trees, a mountain lion slowly walking right behind her. A mental command sent a swarm of insects to converge on the predetor as the girl ran head long into Mantis' arms. He had to crouch down to grasp her as she couldn't be more than five or six years old. The lion swatted and growled at the large ammount of bugs that surrounded it, and was beaten off by repeated bites and stings on its muzzle, eyes, and where the fur was thin.
The girl was crying and relieved to be in the arms of another human being. "Whats the matter? Where are your parents?" He asked in his moderately pitched voice, it wasn't deep, but it wasn't high either. Past the sobbing, the girl managed "I don't know. I was playing with my dolls and then I was in the woods." Though it was botched through the sniffling and crying. Mantis picked her up and dismissed the insects that came to his aid from within the woods.
The boy, who was probably about fourteen or fifteen, took her back to the house and explained what had happened to Mark. "Little girl, where are you from?" He asked in an unusually soft tone. "I don't know..." But she spoke with a seemingly british or australian accent.
From that day on another person was added to the house, and treated as one of the 'family', with Mark as the father, Mantis the son, and the small girl, whose name was Julie, as the daughter. A botched family of people who had nothing to do with one another, but that was alright, they still got along and took care of one another. Mantis kept training, and Julie just played around with the bugs that her 'brother' called up, mostly butterflies and such.
They eventually realized what had brough the small girl to them, she had the ability to teleport. She couldn't do it very many times, but if she wanted to she could have been to china and back in an instant. She had no idea where she lived however, being so young, and couldn't go back to where ever it was she'd come from.
Finally, another few years after the girl had appeared in the woods, Mark brought up something about Mantis' magic, "Theres a school...for magic users. It's called Arcane Academy....I think you should take Julie and sign up, they can teach you alot more about your magic than I can, and you can become stronger."
The blonde young man was probably around twenty, he still didn't remember how old he was, and the girl with the same hair color was eight or so. They left the old house and the closest thing to a father they'd had in years, and made their way to Babylos, the massive floating island in the sky.