Testing Testing

...a kidney.

The perfect child for the perfect family; as the only son of long-trying mother Lisa Tepes and her doting husband Yuri Volodymyra, Luka's birth seemed like a blessing from the heavens. He was the image of the prodigal son, endowed by perfect-pitch and his father's “wealth” he was trained as a vocalist for one of the North Blue's prestigious operas. Despite the early pressure placed upon him, he always seemed like a happy boy as he hummed and sang at all hours of the day.

Though the boy had little time for friends, Luka's mother wouldn't allow her boy to go as poorly socialized as his father. Yuri was a nice enough man, but he had been raised as a classical musician, in truth she knew that results were all that mattered to her husband. To Lisa, kindness mattered, respect for life mattered, honor, nobility, love and loyalty, these were the things that made a man; these were the graces that her son should carry forward.

It's a shame that all good things in this world come with a price, and the price for young Luka would be the health of his mother. Initially, no issue was apparent; Lisa seemed a bit less energetic, but perhaps that was simply what was to be expected of a woman's transition into motherhood? The woman's blood-laden coughing fits soon put an end to this hopeful assumption.

The family spent months in the hospital, each day the boy and his father mourned together; there was no clear end to the sickness in sight. Luka hated this place, it was like a sterile prison where the specter of death hung above those most innocent and helpless, a place where even those who sought to help seemed as if they were marching to the mechanical beating of the reaper's drum.

Everything would be alright wouldn't it? If Yuri kept working, if he kept taking out loans, then Lisa would be alright wouldn't she? As the patriarch of the Volodymyra sought out treatment after treatment only one thing could be clearly deduced: the cause of the illness was related to a change in the woman's immune system that had been affecting her body since the birth of Luka.

Upon hearing the diagnosis all love vacated itself from Yuri's heart. The woman he loved was gone, as good as dead; and the son who he had sunken his dreams on was little more than a parasite who had taken her from him. There was no treatment that could save her, and the woman was given six months to live as she returned to live out her final days in the family home.

As Luka dutifully attended to his ailing mother, his father's resentment grew greater and greater. To witness the love she had for her boy, unfading and unconditional in its strength, it killed him inside; and it would kill her too soon enough. Nonetheless, Lisa showed endless kindness to her boy, just as she wished he would show the world in her stead.

Until that fateful day, the boy doted on his mother with all his heart; receiving merciless beatings each night from his increasingly desperate and miserable father, all the while never saying a word against the man. He still loved his father, the man had given him his voice, given him his education, Yuri had given his son everything he could ask for and more…

Then came the night, it was the last day of December 1824, Luka's 16th birthday. Lisa's life would end on the day it had truly begun, and before her departure she would leave her son with her treasured pendant and a simple wish, “Luka, you are a gift; never let anybody tell you otherwise. If my life is what it took to create a wonderful boy like you, then I am happy to have given it. Please…” the woman drew her final breath as she spoke her last words to her son, “... promise me you'll sing again.”

That night, both men of the Volodymyra family cried until they fell unconscious; Luka at his mother's side, and Yuri in his late wife's dressing room. She was a woman worthy of all the love in the world, and now she was gone.

Upon awakening, Yuri found his wretched son curled up beside his mother's deathbed, like a pathetic whimpering dog. He would have no more of this burden; the man strode furiously to his study and grabbed the enormous stack of debts that he had taken out from local institutions (legitimate and otherwise), “Here boy. Here's what you owe me, your tutelage and the medical expenses for my wife that you killed. I'll fetch us some tobacco for the evening and we can figure out what you're going to do to make a living.”

“I know you're not coming back. Do you not have anything left to say? No final beating for the road?” Luka inquired resentfully of his father as the man made his way towards the front door. The boy knew that soon he would truly be alone.

“Ha! What a smart lad. No Luka, you're not my son. I'll waste no more effort in trying to correct a worthless failure like you. You're not worth bruising my knuckles on,” these were the man's last words as he departed, fleeing from this cursed child and the deathly emptiness he brought with him.

“Not your son…” the boy spoke quietly out into his empty house as his father left, “... fine then,” this was the day that Luka would forsake the name Volodymyra, and live solely as the son of Tepes. In times past they were known as a clan of vicious executioners, but perhaps by living an honest life he could honor his Mother's vision of the family: one kind and merciful, but honorbound to protect those things most precious no matter what it took.

It wasn't long before Luka was paid a visit by some of his father's debtors, enforcers belonging to the Orbweaver Unified Creed, or O.U.C: one of the many well-connected street gangs of Spider Miles. It was made perfectly clear what would happen to the boy if he tried to skip town like his old man, “...we'll chop ya up and stuff ya down the fuckin' gutter kid,” these words stuck with him, and were hammered home by the ruthless gang-beating that came with it.

There, thrown into a pile of trash, Luka thought he was going to die. Sat beside him, as though placed there by some guardian angel, was an immaculate peach discarded alongside a box of rotting fruit; in his final moments at least he could savor the kiss of something sweet, he didn't even notice the fruit's unusual shape nor the spiral patterns marking its surface.

It tasted like cough syrup, its juices a sickly sweet swill that the boy's refined palette was immediately inclined to reject. But what did it matter? These were his final moments, the least he could do is finish his food, and so he did. As the boy whimpered, drooled and cried into his coming demise, he began to feel at ease; as though his body had been refreshed and repaired by some unknown healer. It was a miracle.

Ever since then Luka has lived each day as though it were his last, performing odd jobs for those few kindly people of Spider Miles and awaiting the day the gangs would kill him for missing his deadlines. By the time he was 18 he was getting desperate, the young man had sold everything in his parents' house, hell he'd even sold the house itself. It still wasn't enough to pay the bills and eat at the same time.

Then, on a stray bulletin board, he saw it: five billion Berri? All for a single man by the name of Gray Starks? With that kind of money he could pay his debts twice-over. But that wasn't the end of the bountiful board's blessing's, no, there were plenty of criminals with a price on their heads; plenty who didn't look quite as tough as the stern-faced redhead too.

That was the day Lika acquired his title as a One-Star Bounty Hunter, since then he's been able to make rent, pay his bills, and afford the occasional amenity. By taking hints from the O.U.C he's managed to avoid making too much trouble for himself with local gangs and has simultaneously gained two stars from his organization over the course of the years.

It certainly seems to him that he is without enemies; but in truth, the layers of manipulation that O.U.C have woven into Luka's life run deeper than he could ever know. The Bounty Hunter Association doesn't take *that* large of a cut, the Orbweavers are just taking their tax for doing business, mostly to keep the useful stray on their leash. The guy isn't even paying his deadbeat dad's debts, he's paying the organization a “fee” for Yuri's protection, allowing his estranged father to live the good life.

Most curiously, it seems that any time Luka builds any real rapport with a young woman she seems to disappear. At one point the Stray had quite the crush on a local soap maker's daughter, he couldn't help but gush about the girl to his closest friend Shin (the owner of the noodle shop); a couple weeks later the girl went missing. This has happened twice since, the young man attributes these strange happenings to the curse of Volodymyra, and has tried his best to abandon any hope of romance.