Not all birds start life knowing how to fly with their own wings.

For flight was a curious thing. It couldn't be taught. It couldn't be learned. It couldn't be sought after. It certainly could never be forced for something like that couldn't be made to happen. For once, even wishing seemed to do no good in the matter.

But this does not mean that birds do not fly.

It simply means that a path must be found in its own special way.

These sorts of things never were certain, after all.

Alphonse Fawkes Wingates-St. Grey III had yet to find his way. That one thing was certain. And in an uncertain world the likes of which held the dreams of the people of Destiny City, one certain thing was truly remarkable.

A tiny flash of a bird flitted past before its delicate, feathered form could be processed in the bright light of day. It was an ordinary day with not much to distinguish it from the one before unless you knew where to look. But even fate sometimes casts her eyes from her book's pages every once and in a while.

Alphonse could feel it in the air like a second sense. The boy, for what felt like the first time in a long while, could simply be. Or, at least, the child of barely eighteen thought for a brief moment.

Things were supposed to be clear like a storybook coming to its final chapter. What had the councilor said? You are a senior, after all, everything should be falling into place. And, by all accounts, you could say it was.

It was his final semester of high school. He was passing all his classes and even earning a college credit. He had passed the exit exam with good marks. He had even been accepted into a college preparatory program. His advisor had suggested some courses to take to help him decided on his major. An internship with the local park service was lined up for the summer.

Everything was finally falling into place. But why didn't it feel like it was?

The late afternoon breeze caused a flurry of flowers to fall from a just bloomed tree over the path. The pink petals danced on the stone pavement. A spiraling wind whisked them out of sight like magic.

The warm air played at the collar of the spindly-framed boy's uniform. The light accented the colors of cream and orange of this clothing and the dim warmth penetrated the cotton. A simple bell on a black ribbon on his left wrist sounded delicately as he moved with bated steps.

A strong updraft caused him to stop. A feather-like shock of blond hair fell into his warm amber eyes and he swept it out of his sun-lit face. His fingers brushed on the scar that ran across his nose to his bright cheeks tenderly.

It made him remember.

There was a life before now. Alphonse had been much younger then. Barely a child even. Yet he could recall some of it just as clearly as the scar on his face.

It had been a much darker time for him even if there had been sunny days like this. It was after the accident when he lost his parents. He still does not know what happened other than it left him with a nasty gash on his face. By the time he awoke from unconsciousness, everything had been decided. He was an orphan. All alone, they had said. Poor thing. They almost meant it.

Humans had a way of almost meaning something.

Well, the poor boy was almost a man now. The ashes of the past had long been burned away. The half-dead child had emerged from the flames a modern-day phoenix.

Then what was this feeling of unease?

Alphonse had reached the field without even knowing how he had gotten there. Perhaps it was his musings that caused him to not notice where he was going. He had a way of loosing himself when he was worried and the feeling had been hard to shake.

His thoughts weren't with himself any longer for they couldn't be. He could hear a feral cry. The cry of another was enough to tear him from his lonely thoughts to a tree, standing alone in the middle of the field.

Whatever was there across the way was in pain and Alphone's heart could not bare its calling. He never could before and perhaps never would be able to ignore the strange calling of his heart.

Alphonse did not think twice about running to the aid of the cry and perhaps he should have. At first, it did not seem like anything was wrong. There a cat lying in the grass and, in the tree's lofty shadow, it almost looked to be asleep. But when he bent down to pet the small, grey creature and place the tiny beast into his arms, the cat opened its lavender eyes. The look was one that the boy had never before seen, but it was short lived and Alphonse did not have time to understand it.

As if like a clarion call, the beautiful star's light pierced the darkness of the shadow and a strange wind surrounded the boy.

The beast that came at the light's call was a youma, but the boy didn't know that world yet even if he would soon be thrust unwillingly into it. The closest word he knew to describe the creature didn't fit it in the least. For Alphose thought it looked a little bit like a fairy.

He recalled the fairy tales read to him in his youth.

Oh, he could recall the tales as well. Fantastic stories of good and evil. Magic and life. Knights and kings. Fairies and birds of many colors in golden cages. He had loved those the best as he ran his fingers along the gold-leafed pages.

But this wasn't fantasy.

The creature looked at him with glowing eyes and all it saw was a foolish human that was interfering in a world where he didn't belong.

A thin, toxic veil of scales emanated over the child as he held the cat close. It forced him to close his eyes as its shimmer was blinding. There was no escaping as the boy felt the ground frantically trying to find something, anything at all, that could help him now.

Killing a human wasn't difficult. Even a youma, the weakest of the forms that Chaos possessed, could manage it. Draining precious life energy until it was all spent could be done on a whim.

Alphonse could feel the life fading from his form. It was unlike anything he had felt before, except on that one day that the scar on his face would never let him forget. Then, as if struck by a mortal blow, he recognized the feeling.

Alphonse was going to die.

And it was in that moment of realization that the starseed in his chest was awoken.

It was like a flame of pure energy bursting from his chest. A once ordinary soul was shedding its once dull shine as a flower of fiery petals embraced the seed. It bloomed to unveil a pure starseed of the brightest hue.

The light burned the youma and it fell to dust before the boy. The sun once again shown upon the field. The cat leapt away onto a tree branch as it watched with gleaming eyes.

As the dust settled, a glowing object floated before Alphonse. It was a golden incense burner shaped like a gilded bird cage with a fragile chain dangling from it. The weapon emitted a pleasant scent. It was mesmerizing. The boy's eyes shone like spirited orbs as he stared in wonder at the thing. He believed that he had never seen something so beautiful in all his life.

Alphonse, without thinking and as if he was always meant to do so, embraced the pure light of the object and the spirit of the mythical wonder smiled upon the boy as his appearance changed in a rainbow of starlight.

The change only lasted a few mere seconds, but the feeling was one in which the boy had never felt. A feeling he had never thought he would feel.

Belonging.

With a blissful, carefree smile on his face, Alphonse Wingates-St. Grey fainted.

It was only minutes later that he awoke in the field under the tree dreaming of the shinning white uniform, the golden incense burner and a maiden called Cosmos.

For a moment, Alphonse thought that he had dreamed the whole thing up in his mind.

But then he saw a cat watching him from a distance before knowingly slipping away.

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