"I have no friends close enough to mention anymore, and no living family left in this cruel world..." I thought to myself. "I am completely and utterly alone now..." Accepting that this world had nothing else for me to live for anymore, I closed my already blinded eyes and stepped right off the ledge of the roof...

Four years earlier...

“Hey, Jude!" Uncle Thalion shouted from the first floor. "If we don’t hurry up, we won’t get there in time!”

“Okay, okay! Just gimme another minute!” I shouted back, trying to finish a solo kill on a Lv.150 boss monster with my Lv.100 Grand Archer.

My bedroom door suddenly swung wide open and Uncle Thalion came barging in, asking “What’s more important, killing a boss in a video game? or competing in the qualifiers?”

“Qualifiers...” I answered under my breath, getting the boss to a quarter health.

Lifting up one side of my headset, Uncle Thalion shouted directly into my ear, “Then get your ass in the car!” aggressively shaking my chair while he did so.

Surprised by the sudden shake, I accidentally misclicked and moved right in the range of the boss’s one-hit kill attacks, instantly taking my health to 0 and killing my character. “Nooo! I was so close!” Staring at the boss’s health at 10% remaining.

“Look you died, now so let’s go." Uncle Thalion pointed out. "We’ve got to get to Toronto by noon tomorrow if we want to register you in time for the Olympic Archery Qualifiers.”

“I know, I know.” Closing the game and shutting off the computer, “But don’t worry so much, Uncle Thal, we’ll make it in time. And I’ll definitely win my spot on the Olympic Archery Team.”

Uncle Thalion chuckled, “Too bad your parents couldn’t see how poorly I raised you, my brother would've killed me if he saw how full of yourself you are nowadays—thinking you can easily qualify for the Olympic Team at your age.”

“Well if only I could’ve qualified before I was 16, then I'd already be on the team by now." I confidently stated, picking up my already packed bag.

Uncle Thalion scoffed, "You say that now, but how are you gonna qualify for the team when you haven't even beaten retired ol' me once in all these years, huh?"

"Oh c'mon, y'know no one's better than you, Uncle Thal." I complimented him, truly believing his archery skills were the best in the whole world.

"That's right, and you better remember it!" He replied, happily leading the way down the stairs.

"But y'know, since I've already been competing with the best for years now, wouldn't you agree that qualifiers should be a piece of cake for me?" I reasoned.

Although Uncle Thalion simply ignored me and laughed to himself, saying "I really am still the best, huh. Hahaha...."

"And he wonders why I'm so full of myself." Rolling my eyes and shaking my head at him still laughing to himself, "I clearly learned it from someone just as full of themselves."

My parents passed away in a terrible accident when I was only 7 years old. In the aftermath of the accident I was left in the custody of my only other living relative, my dad’s older brother, Uncle Thalion Bryce. Even though he was older than my dad, Uncle Thalion never had a family of his own, deciding to only focus on his already incredible Professional Archery career and training for the Olympics. When I first fell into his custody he had absolutely no clue how to take care of a child; awkwardly trying talking to me about things he thought i was interested in, forgetting to cook enough food for the both of us, never picking me up after school, and even outright forgetting to enroll me into school in the first place. I think it was because he still really wanted to compete in Archery Competitions and the Olympics, but felt obligated to take care of me, so he spent all his time frantically juggling between me and his archery training. I was too young to really remember the exact moment, but at some point Uncle Thalion stopped his training entirely, and purely just focused on taking care of me instead.

When I was 6 years old I remembered my parents and me watching and cheering for Uncle Thalion when he got his 3rd Olympic Gold Medal for Archery, and as I got older, I realized Uncle Thalion gave up his chance on going for his 4th Gold Medal because of me. Then when I was around 10 years old, I made a promise to myself that I’d get Uncle Thalion that 4th Gold Medal, the one he never had the chance to get. And so I began asking him for archery lessons. At first he was really surprised by my unexpected interest, but he eventually became overjoyed by my genuine enthusiasm for learning archery. Uncle Thalion taught me everything he knew about archery, and I mean everything.

We never solely focused on competitive archery like for the Olympics, but also practiced the different styles of archery from all over the world, and after only just half a year of training, I quickly learned I had quite a talent for it—along with it being a surprising amount of fun. I not only began learning all the different Western and Eastern styles of archery, but also bow hunting during hunting seasons, and mounted archery on horseback during the summers. Then what began as a promise to get Uncle Thalion a 4th Gold Medal, slowly became and turned into a desire and dream to earn one for myself.

Double checking that we had everything for the trip, Uncle Thalion asked "Forget anything?"

"Nope." I answered, but remembering something I mentioned "Have I ever told you how amazing it is that you got 3 Gold Medals in the Olympics?"

“Oh no you don’t." He said, stopping me from trying to butter him up more. "You only bring up my medals when you want something. So spit it out, what do you want?” Already knowing I wanted something.

“You caught me.” Putting my hands up and telling him, “If I really do make it on the Olympic Team, I want the new Galaxy Range Recurve Bow Model X as a congratulations present.”

Uncle smiled, “If you really do make it on the Olympic Team, I’ll even get you the Compound Model X too, how’s that sound?”

Completely happy and stoked to hear that, I pumped my fist and quickly said “That’s a promise, okay? You can’t take it back!”

“I won’t. But if you don’t make it on the Team, I’ll make you do 10,000 hours of shooting practice instead, got that?” Holding out his pinky finger to me.

“Deal!” Promising with our pinkies.

“Now let's get going already!” And we both jumped in the car and set off on our way.

Waking up to the dark cloudy night sky, I saw that Uncle Thalion was still driving on the same windy sloped road I fell asleep on in the afternoon, but noticed his eyes were now looking really tired. Seeing only the car’s headlights shining on the road and the time on the dashboard, I said to him “Uncle Thal, it’s already 2am and you’ve been driving since morning, let me take over and you can sleep for a bit.”

“I know you have your learner’s permit, but I don’t think you're allowed to drive this late at night.” Uncle Thal pointed out.

“Oh c'mon, Uncle Thal, we’re on an empty road and it’s not like there’s any cops around here.” I said, pulling out my learner’s permit from my wallet to show him. “Just for a little bit? So you can rest?”

He sighed knowing that I wouldn’t be refused, and reluctantly said “Okay, fine. But just for an hour or two, got it?”

“Got it.” I happily repeated, as Uncle Thalion pulled over and we switched seats.

Putting our seatbelts on, Uncle Thalion said “Now be careful. Keep your eyes on the road. And don’t go over the speed limit.”

“I know, I know.” As I slowly accelerated the car and began driving back on the highway. Uncle Thalion stayed up for a bit, nervously warning me about any incoming vehicles, or how I was slightly drifting from the lines, but after an hour of perfectly driving, Uncle relaxed and slowly closed his eyes to sleep.

I drove for another two hours when it suddenly began heavily pouring rain outside. “This is crazy, I can’t see a thing.” I said to myself, turning on the windshield wipers as fast as possible, and trying my best to see the road through the heavy rainfall. “I better wake up Uncle Thal.”

Except before I could wake up Uncle Thalion, a large bolt of lightning suddenly came crashing down from the now thunderous sky, striking a nearby tree on the road ahead—the sound deafening, and the ight momentarily blinding. My eyes quickly recovered from the lightning's flash, though out of nowhere, a herd of deer came running across the road. Panicking, I immediately hit the breaks and swerved away from the direction of the deer, but with the speed of the car and wet tires and ground, the car went tumbling off the windy and steep road.

Hearing the heavy rain falling onto the outside of the car, I slowly opened my eyes, but everything was just a fuzzy blur to me. I could feel sharp pains coming from all over my body, especially my head, with blood dripping upwards. I quickly realized that the car was now upside down, and reached for the seat belt release button. After pressing on the button, my body came crashing down. “Urgh…” I groaned, feeling the tiny pieces of shattered glass on the ground hit my back. “U-Uncle Thal... Are you alright?” Looking at Uncle's blurry red body hanging upside.

Not getting a response, I crawled across the shattered glass to his body, and began trying to feel for the release button—my sight still being extremely fuzzy and blurry. Finding the button, I said “I’m sorry Uncle Thal, but this might hurt.” I tried my best to cushion Uncle’s fall as his heavy body fell on top of me. “Uncle Thal, can you hear me? Are you alright?” But I started freaking out when I felt a lot of blood coming out of his head, “No, no, no, no...” Taking off my flannel shirt, I began wrapping it tightly around his head, but there was still so much blood. “Don’t worry, Uncle Thal, I’ll go find you some help. Just hang in there!”

Crawling across the glass on the ground, I got a few small cuts on my hand, but I ignored them and crawled my way through the broken windshield. Frantically standing up, my body felt really weak and heavy as the rainfall drenched every part of it and obscured my already blurry vision even further. Using all my energy, I struggled to climb to the top of the slippery slope, yet I somehow made it back to the road. Then standing in the middle of the road, I began running in a direction—my body swaying back-and-forth—needing to find help as quickly as possible.

“Help, help! We need your help!" Desperately calling for anyone to hear me. And after what felt like the longest minutes of my life, headlights finally came into my view, and I shouted "Over here! There’s someone injured back over there! Please, he needs—” All of a sudden a wave of throbbing pain filled my head, and my vision blurred even furtherer as I helplessly watched the whole world suddenly turn to its side, finding myself laying on wet raining ground. However, after seeing a few figures get out of their vehicle, I desperately pleaded “P-Please...help…my uncle...” Pointing behind me as everything then turned into black.

Slowly coming to consciousness, I could hear a steady beeping right next to me, repeating every second or so. Opening my eyes, I saw nothing but black. I struggled to lift my body up from the bed, as well as felt multiple things attached all over my body. “W-What the hell... Where am I... And why can’t I see…” I struggled to speak, and I could hear the beeping noise getting slightly faster. Then remembering the crash, I could barely shout “Uncle Thal... Where are you!” I got off the bed and pulled whatever was attached to me. But the moment I tried to stand myself up, my legs collapsed under me, and some of whatever was attached to me came off, while the others came crashing onto the cold floor on top of me. “What the hell is happening... Help... Help!” The beeping noise was now a constant long beep.

A few seconds later, I heard a door open up and a woman say “Oh my gosh, I can’t believe you're awake! Let me help!” The woman helped me up from the ground and brought me back to the bed.

“Thank you... B-But who are you...and where am I?" I questioned. "And have you seen my uncle... His name is Thalion Bryce.”

“First I need you to relax, and to please lay back down. I need to reattach the EKG to you." She said politely and calmly. "And to answer your question... You’ve been asleep for a really long time.” Attaching something on my chest again.

“Asleep? For how long?” I asked, confused of my current situation.

“It’s best I let Dr.Abe explain the details to you But to answer a few more of your questions, you're currently in the best hospital in the city, and I'm the nurse assigned to take care of you. You can call me Nurse Kate, or just Kate if you prefer. But for now just lay down and rest. I’ll go get the doctor and some food for you, okay?” I could hear her open the door to the room again and close right after she left.

Waiting for a few minutes, still feeling disoriented and confused about my current situation, the door suddenly opened again, and a man said “Hello, Jude. My name is Dr.Abe. I know you must be very confused right, but can you tell me how you're body's feeling?” Also hearing the nurse walk in with food, as she then placed in front of me.

“I feel tired and weak...and I can’t see anything right now for some reason.” Feeling up my extra skinny body, and closing and opening my eyes to try to fix my vision. “But more importantly...how’s my uncle doing? His name is Thalion Bryce.”

I could hear Dr.Abe nervously pause before speaking, “About that Jude...on your way to the hospital from your accident, you fell into a deep coma, and you’ve only just recovered today.”

“Are you saying...Uncle Thal also fell into a deep coma?” Worried about that thought.

Dr.Abe paused again, “No. This may be hard for you to believe, but the accident I’m referring to happened over three years ago..." I had no response, still trying to process what the doctor just said. "Your uncle did make it to the hospital with you, but..." he paused yet again, "He unexpectedly passed away a month after being admitted here.”

“W-What…” Not processing anything he said.

“Your uncle, Thalion Bryce, he passed away three years ago, Jude... I’m so sorry.” Sharing his condolences.

“What are you talking about? Uncle Thal isn’t dead!” I denied.

“I know this will take some to process, but—.”

“Why would you lie about something like that?” Flipping the tray of food in front of me off the bed.

“Please calm down, Jude. Your body is really weak right now, and can't handle this much stress.” The doctor said in concern.

“If you want me calm, bring Uncle Thal to me right...” My head suddenly felt extremely weak, and I found myself quickly losing consciousness.

Waking up again some time after, I still couldn’t see anything, and Nurse Kate brought food for me again and helped me eat it some of it. Dr.Abe came back later and didn't mention anything about Uncle Thal, and just explained how the accident caused the blood circulation of my optic nerves to be cut off completely, causing me to apparently lose my sight permanently. Hearing more devastating news, I went into another fit of rage and denial, and eventually ended up passing out again from all the stress again. This routine continued on for another few days until they finally ran out of bad news to tell me.

About a week later after I first woke up, a lawyer came by to my room and read a general will from Uncle Thalion to. It said I would be given everything Uncle Thalion had, but what really infuriated me was when the lawyer mentioned how he felt sorry Uncle Thalion never got to write a proper will because he was only 42 years old and never expected dying so soon. The lawyer also briefly explained that all the hospital bills were already paid off by my trust fund that my parents created for me, which was previously managed by uncle, but was now entirely mine to manage. "I couldn't care less about this stupid shit!" I angrily thought to myself, unnecessarily stressing myself out, and passing out again.

A few more days passed, and I was told that I would have to be hospitalized until my body could fully recover, and had enough strength to stand and walk on my own. I was forced to miserably suffer my days in this lonely and sad hospital room, only leaving for physiotherapy to help my muscles get back in shape, or to do some scans in the various medical machines, and only talked to less than 3 people a day. Days went by, then weeks, and then months; until finally one year had arrived, and I hit my lowest of points.

Finding myself on the ledge of the hospital's roof, I felt absolute dread and depression. My sight was lost with no modern medical science anywhere near close enough to bring it back. My dream of ever becoming an Olympic Gold Medalist in Archery went up in smoke without my eyesight. And most importantly, Uncle Thalion was gone, never getting to thank him for all he had done for me, never getting a chance to say a proper goodbye, and never getting to apologize for causing the accident.

"I have no friends close enough to mention anymore, and no living family left in this cruel world..." I thought to myself. "I am completely and utterly alone now..." Accepting that this world had nothing else for me to live for anymore, I closed my already blinded eyes and stepped right off the ledge of the roof.

I expected it all to stop and become nothingness, not believing in some greater higher power, but for the first time in four years, I saw something. A strange light blue screen that displayed:

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