Paria App

Arashi is strongly goal-directed and persistent. Ambitious, serious and dedicated to duty, he is the type of person who will triumph and achieve success. His aptitude to persevere, no matter how difficult the road, sets him apart from most of his peers. He can usually reach his goals because of his sense of the right way of doing everything. His patience is never ending.

He is a very thoughtful and serious person, thinking everything through carefully before he sets off in any direction. He possesses excellent reasoning skills, and can be counted on to select options that are both practical and that provide an economic advantage. His attitude is conservative; conservative with time, money, and all other resources. His philosophy is waste not, want not.

Arashi is a high-powered physical and mental person. His energies, at times, seem boundless. His personality seems a strange pairing of strict discipline with bold enthusiasm and idealism, producing a sometimes worldly-wise personality that handles self and others with the greatest of ease. He loves the camaraderie of getting together with the gang, being involved in a multiplicity of interests and activities. Arashi needs to develop concentration and encouragement of staying power to maintain his drive and purpose.

He is a traveler at heart, and has a need to be on the go all the time, either physically or mentally. With the enthusiasm he naturally possesses, reckless expenditure of energies can be a problem. He has a lot of ambition, and can be both political and direct in going after his objectives; diplomatic or shrewd, as well as frank and sincere. Using either approach, he is instinctively honest and truthful. He is a very expressive person with high ideals and a keen sense of values. A good mentality and quick wit give him a way with words.

He doesn't handle chaotic situations very well, and needs to lighten up a little and not take life and everything else so seriously. Although he is self-disciplined, responsible, and practical, at times he wallows in self-pity.

Arashi combines a talent for management with an ability to carry out instructions with care, taking job and duties very seriously. Therefore, he is never one to shirk responsibility and has very little use for those that do. That which matters most to him is his public image. He shows his best face to the public. He enjoys being in a position of power and authority, although he is not very much inclined to enjoy the limelight. He is loyal and dedicated, and demands the same from teammates. He is often unconcerned about, sometimes even ruthless toward, those getting in his way.

Arashi knows that his words have impact on others, especially the sensitive types whom he often offends with very direct speech. Although he is a broad and inclusive person with strong humanitarian instincts, in many ways he is a little picky when it comes to friends and close relationships. He insists that those he associates with be intellectually compatible, and when he finds himself in the company of people he considers intellectually inferior, he is terribly uncomfortable. Companionship is very important to him, but intellect is usually placed ahead of sentiment.

Sober and reserved in his dealings with others, it takes him a good while to warm up enough to anyone to be considered a close friend. Yet once he does, he is a very caring, reliable, and most steadfast ally. His private side is different from his public side. In private he is shy and sensitive. The harshness of his public image disappears. Emotionally demanding relationships are very difficult, as his is unsure of himself in most intimate situations.

Hoshimawari Arashi stretched out on the grass below his house and stuck his hands behind his head. It was a clear, cool autumn night, the kind where the stars stood so close you could practically pick them from the sky. He wriggled himself deeper into the little hollow he had worn in the hillside from years of taking this exact position for this exact activity. Tradition was good.

As the stars wheeled by in their infinitesimally slow way, sleep crept up on Arashi and ambushed him.
 

The stars swirled in crazy patterns, dancing a jig against the black velvet backdrop of deep night. Arashi sat up in outrage and fear; what was going on here? Stars didn't move like that! They stayed put in predictable patterns, familiar safe predictable patterns.

He scrambled to his feet, staring up at the sky. Finally the stars settled back to patterns, but they weren't the patterns of the Paria sky. Racking his memory, he recalled that they were the patterns in the sky over Doitra. The blasted planet. Just as he came to that realisation, a single star blazed brilliantly in the southeastern corner of the sky. "The star of war ... " he murmured without knowing why the words came to his lips.

A great voice echoed around him. "What is the destiny of the star of war?" it asked. The brilliant star pulsed in time to the words.

Again the voice repeated, "What is the destiny of the star of war?"

A third time it boomed, "What is the destiny of the star of war?"

Arashi was driven to his knees by the power in that voice, a voice he dimly recognised as being suspiciously similar to his own. With a thunderous crash, two stars fell from the sky and met at his feet. When the smoke cleared, a tall figure clad in ancient (Roman) half-armour met Arashi's eyes gravely. The person bore a spear in one hand, a round shield on the opposite arm, and a helmet covered most of the figure's face.

Arashi clenched his fists. "Who are you?"

The figure removed his helmet, revealing a face startlingly similar to Arashi's own, were it aged twenty or thirty years. "I think the real question is, who are you, Hoshimawari Arashi, storm star of destiny?"

"Sounds like you already know," Arashi retorted.

The man stood easily, relaxed and at ease, helmet tucked under one arm. Kneeling, he placed the spear on the ground between them. His compelling eyes captured Arashi's. "Why are you here, Hoshimawari Arashi, storm star of destiny?"

Arashi blinked. That had been a completely unexpected question.

The man's voice gained intensity. "What is your destiny, Hoshimawari Arashi, storm star of destiny?" He laid peculiar emphasis on the final word. Replacing the helmet on his head, the man repeated in a near whisper, "What is the destiny of the star of war?"

Arashi stared at the helmed figure. "I don't have to put up with this." He turned on his heel and strode away, back expressing the anger he felt at having his star-gazing interrupted. It was hard enough getting a night free to do it without having strangers drop in from messed-up starscapes and ask him strange questions. He took about 5 steps, looked up, and found himself face-to-face with the helmed man again, the spear between them.

"You cannot leave this place until you have answered my questions with the purest answer."

Again Arashi stared. "The 'purest answer'? What's that supposed to mean?"

"What is the answer of your soul?"

Arashi started to snap back an answer, but something stopped him. He thought about the questions. In a peculiar way, they all seemed to mesh together. The destiny of the star of war ...

"I am the star of war. I am a Paria Senshi."

The starscape above cracked crazily. Pieces began to rain down, sticking into the ground around him. The figure shimmered and vanished, leaving Arashi trapped in a growing maze of stars. As he began to cast about for a way to escape, the faint cry of a child reached his ears. Arashi determinedly ignored it, knowing he had to help himself before he could help anyone else. He ran through the maze, turning left and right, as more and more pieces of the starry sky fell down around him. The maze seemed to grow in complexity as he attempted to traverse it. Corridors he was sure he'd been down before changed as soon as his back was turned.

More and more often, he felt a faint tug, near-instinctual, directing him. He followed those leads through the twisting, changing paths, and discovered that the instinct was never wrong.

At last he fetched up in a three-way divide. To the left, he could see an exit ... an exit that was rapidly being closed by the falling stars. But the instinct that had led him through the maze was urging him stright ahead, and now that he paused to listen the cries of the child -- a girl -- were much stronger.

He stopped, watching the exit, knowing that every second that passed diminished his chance of getting out, or, apparently, even surviving, as a falling piece of sky scored his arm. The pieces began to fall more thickly around him, closing him in, leaving him with two choices: forward, or out.

Gritting his teeth, Arashi moved forward, toward the child. All his survival instincts screamed at him to get out while he could, but there was NO WAY he was going to leave someone else in here to be cut to shreds by the stars. Carefully he dodged around the razor-sharp pieces, drawing nearer to the cries, which were abruptly broken by a sharp cry of pain.

Abandoning caution, Arashi sped up the corridor, praying it wouldn't change behind him. He rounded a corner and nearly tripped over the child, a teenage girl not much younger than he was. She acknowledged his presence with a faint moan. Her skin was ribboned with streaks, her fingers near-useless with cuts and sticky with drying blood.

Arashi bent down over her. There was obviously no way he could lead her by the hand through the maze. "Can you walk?" he asked. As she turned her head toward his voice, he realised: she was blind. That was why she hadn't made it out on her own, and why she was so wounded. Underneath the blood, though, he could see that she was pretty.

"I think so," she replied. Her voice was soft, and rang like bells. Arashi helped her to her feet as gently as possible, and began to make his way back through the maze. She bit her lip against cries of pain, and once stumbled heavily against him. At last, racing against time, Arashi swept the girl up into his arms and began to run back down the corridor.

As he emerged back into the triple divide, he could see that the exit was nearly blocked. If the girl crawled, she would be able to make it, being more slender than Arashi himself. But, Arashi realised, there would only be time for one of them to escape. If that one was lucky.

He stumbled to a halt before the exit. Putting the girl down, he told her of the situation quickly, then directed her toward the opening. She tried to demur, urging him toward the opening, but he was firm. Together, they managed to get her through the opening. She yanked her foot through on his shout as a huge star tumbled down to block the opening, and the ragged edge caught Arashi on the head.
 

"Wake up," a voice boomed in Arashi's ear. "You have one final test to pass."

Arashi didn't open his eyes yet, as he wondered blurrily what test it was he was taking. Surely it wasn't exam time yet? At least it seemed he'd passed all the other tests - why couldn't he remember what tests the person was speaking of? Shaking his head, he sat up and opened his eyes, coming face-to-face with what appeared to be himself. After a start of surprise he realised it was just a mirror ... but why were the reflections moving?

He watched in mild surprise as his reflection paced along a wide, sandy beach, just barely inside the reach of the surf. Wind ruffled the reflection's hair, and Arashi resisted the urge to smooth his hair down just in case. As he gazed at the mirror, a huge wave swept up the beach, swirling around his reflection and yanking him off his feet!

Arashi gasped in horror -- and earned a mouthful of bitter seawater as a reward. Suddenly the wave was swirling around his body, dragging him off his feet, pulling him under. He flailed about, trying to grasp something, but the water slid through his hands and he couldn't seem to reach the bottom. Coughing and gasping, for a nearly fatal moment Arashi surrendered to utter terror and despair. 'I always knew the ocean would take me!' he thought crazily.

Then the sheer need to survive impelled him to struggle again. Rather than swallow any more salt water, he clamped his mouth shut, and almost immediately found he needed to breathe. Attempting to breathe through his nose only gained him another choking fit. Abruptly his head broke the surface and he gasped a breath before the next wave crashed over him, sweeping him back under. With a mighty lunge he thrust himself back up, catching a glimpse of the beach.

Fury suddenly burned through him, driving away the incipient chill. "No ocean is going to defeat me," he gritted, "I'm a Paria senshi. This is not my destiny!" Gulping a quick breath, he attempted to ride the next wave closer to shore. To his utter surprise, the method worked, and he was able to regain his feet in short order.

For long moments, he simply stood there, out of the waves, and shuddered with the aftermath of terror. "I hate the ocean. I just ... loathe the ocean!" he muttered.

"But you survived it," a kind, now-familiar voice pointed out to him. "You have named your destiny. You have demonstrated selflessness. You have faced your greatest fear. What is the destiny of the star of war?"

Dripping, bedraggled, Arashi nevertheless managed to answer proudly, "The destiny of the star of war is to lead the fight against the darkness. I am a Paria senshi."

The armoured man appeared before him again. In the way of dreams, Arashi found that his clothes were dry and clean, and his entire figure as neat as when this whole crazy adventure started. "You have earned that destiny, my other self. Take this," the figure extended a silvery pen topped by a star, "and make us whole once more."

Arashi clasped his hand over his other self's hand. They stood facing each other for a long moment. "I will become you, Star Kamen," Arashi vowed solemnly.

"You have done well."
 

Arashi woke with a start to see the light of dawn paling the eastern sky. Something cool and solid filled his right hand, and he glanced down to find the pen he had taken in the dream. A smile crossed his face ... but the thing that remained the clearest in his mind wasn't his new destiny.

It was the blind girl whose life he had saved.