Chapter 1: A Prelude to Awesome

A terrible, blood curdling scream pierced the night. The cry seemed to rattle the trees surrounding Blanchard river, and indeed, a foul wind blew through the night. A crashing noise was heard, and a woman came tumbling out of some dense foliage, dirtied and besmudged with sweat. She quickly got to her feet and took off running once more. Mere nanoseconds afterwards, two men came through the aforementioned foliage, booking it all speedy like, in hot pursuit of the lady. They quickly caught up to the woman, and totally threw her down on the ground. They then wrestled a purse from her hands and one of the men began to peruse through its contents while the other kept the woman held down. After a minute or so, the purse ganderer threw the bag down in disgust, obviously flustered beyond belief.
“We know you have the Golden Pony of Kubla-Kahn that your husband won at an auction many years ago,” he declared. “Now hand it over!”
“I promised my husband that I would never give up that majestic golden stallion to the Blood-Eyed Cat Syndicate, no matter what happened,” the lady defiantly answered. “You’ll just have to kill me.”
“If that is your desire then let me be your squire,” the second man sing-songed as he grasped his Whiffle Ball bat tight. He raised the child’s play thing high into the air, preparing to strike the woman down, when out of nowhere, KABLOOMERS~! A fist right in his unthinkable face.
The man went down like a sick dog at a child’s birthday party after being fed the leftover cake that accidently still had a candle in it. The other man, obviously both bewildered and bamboozled as to where the seemingly magic fist had appeared from, stood on the spot flabbergasted while a flurry of fists came down and cold cocked him right off his feet. Before the woman could say or do anything other than stare in pure awe at the awesome spectacle that had just taken place before her eyes, the mystery man picked her up with one arm and bolted.
The figure ran straight for a tree at a whopping four miles per hour, and didn’t seem to be slowing down or veering off course. Before the woman could even utter a scream, the figure jumped and climbed the entire length of the tree, all lickity-split.
After the woman had caught her breath, she stammered “You just climbed that tree like it was nothing, like 20 feet in five seconds...” The figure stayed quiet however, yet ever watchful.
“So…” the woman started. “Just who are you?” The enigmatic man remained quiet for a few more moments, and then answered in the most beautiful voice the woman, or anyone else, had ever heard.
“I am the protector of the weak. I am the defender of the downtrodden. I am the keeper of the innocent’s dreams and ideals. I am a lover. I am a fighter. I am Lizard Man.”