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ISBN: 9781608449477
416 pages

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ISBN: 9781457504181
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CHAPTER ONE

The Fated Orphan

The first breeze of Autumn rustled through the leaves of a large Maple Tree. The shadow of the Maple fell across a building of wood and brick. A wooden sign hung on the front of the building. The sign read ‘Orphanage’. Inside the building, a rebellious youth was receiving a lecture.

“Emberillius Ash Jackson.” Tick tock tick tock tick tock tick tock tick tock tick tock. “I just don’t know what to say about you.” Tick tock tick tock tick tock tick tock tick tock. “I placed you with a fine family.” Tick tock tick tock tick tock tick tock. “Two thirtyeight year old individuals with two natural children, and an increasing net worth of one-hundred forty thousand dollars a year.” Tick tock tick tock tick tock. “With the Robertsons, you had a unique opportunity, which you have completely managed to foul up.” Tick tock tick tock. “I’m not even going to ask you about the hamster incident! What do you have to say about yourself?” Tick tock. The space between Emberillius and the man who lectured him held an eerie stillness. Sunlight streamed through the beige blinds hanging on windows behind the man who represented everything he hated about authority. Silence filled the small office, except for the timely ticks from the second hand of the clock, which hung on the wall to Emberillius’ left.

Emberillius reached onto the desktop before him and retrieved a jellybean from the small glass bowl sitting beside an office calendar and personal organizer. “I . . . can’t . . . stand the way your damn clock tick tocks!” erupted Emberillius. “You will stop talking to me like I’m six. I’m sixteen. I do, think, feel, and say what I want, when I want, and answer to none. My nerves; you’re on them like a leech, a parasite, a pest existing only to feed on my frustration and give me grief. The Robertsons suck! You, you suck! The hamsters, you should have heard the sounds they made when the snake ate them, and explanations, I don’t owe you any!”

“Get out of my office!”

“I was on my way out anyway!” Emberillius pushed his chair aside and messed the rug on the floor as he walked out of Dr. Brown’s office and into the television room, where most of the kids in the orphanage spent their spare time. Emberillius grew up here. He was adopted many times, but none of the placements had worked out. Being rejected by various families had molded his young mind. He had come to hate the public’s perception of “the normal family.” He had also come to abhor authority. He was easy enough to get along with, but he was the type of individual who needed a reason for every action. If an adult told him to do something he did not comprehend as reasonable, he questioned them. If their answer did not comply with his reasoning, he did not cooperate. He was this way from the time he began forming complete sentences. At the age of three he refused to eat bologna. The orphanage tried to force him to eat it.

He vomited the bologna all over the table and said with tears in his eyes,

“Why did you make me eat the stinky meat, after I told you I did not like it?”

The woman feeding him replied, “Because bologna is the only meat we have, and you have to learn to eat whatever an adult tells you to eat. You are a child, and you have to learn to stay in a child’s place.”

Little Emberillius looked up at her and said, “I will never eat your stinky meat!” Emberillius never did eat bologna after that incident. He made many such challenges to adults in the future, and each time he defied authority with a will that shocked the personnel who ran the orphanage. These incidents fueled his rage against authority, and imprinted him with a deep resentment for anyone who ordered him to do anything just because he was not an adult. By the time he was thirteen, he had decided he no longer wanted parents. He just wanted to be an adult, or at least to be treated like one. He especially hated the one man who never treated him like an adult, Dr. Thadious Brown. Dr. Brown only wanted the best for all of the children in the orphanage. Sometimes he was extra hard on Emberillius, but it was only because he had a special interest in him. You see, unknown to Emberillius, his mother and Dr. Brown were born of the same woman. Dr. Brown was his blood uncle.

Emberillius had no memory of his own mother, born Tammy Lynn Brown, who was later married to George Mason Jackson. Tammy was a historian, and George was an archaeologist. Tammy, George, and Dr. Brown combed the Earth for history’s secrets. On one dig, they discovered an ancient document which, once translated, revealed clues to the locations of the sixteen journals of Perillius. Perillius, the fabled hero of legend, was said to have spearheaded the war that saved all of humanity from a doomed fate. With the powers of a god he prevailed against the dark forces that sought to enslave the entire Milky Way. The three scientists were overjoyed at the chance to learn more about Perillius. They immediately assembled a team of their most trusted colleagues, which they named Sci Team 16, and dedicated themselves to a worldwide quest for the sixteen journals of Perillius. The sixteen journals of Perillius were said to have been written by the legendary Perillius the Righteous. Most scholars agreed Perillius and his journals were mere myth and nothing more. Legend had it that Perillius descended from the sun, and found a world oppressed by the gods. Perillius looked at the plight of man and had compassion. The legends of ancient mongoloid societies told that it was Perillius who called on the power of the sun and destroyed the dark god, who had become bored with Earth and used it only as a form of amusement. Legend credits Perillius for saving humanity. Sci Team 16 was an organization who believed Perillius had really existed. Most of the members did not believe he had magical powers, but he intrigued them nonetheless.