《The Strongest of Them All》Chapter 2: Myself
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Random Passerby POV
It was all a very regular day. I went out and got the groceries like I usually did and did everything I would have done on a regular day, but it wasn’t. As I left the bookstore, a blinding light flashed through out the streets. It only lasted for a second but I could still see the area it had come from.
It was from Ruby and Toby’s house. They were well known around the neighborhood. Well, I guess it wasn't them that people knew it was their son. Very rarely do we have anyone born with defects. It had been the first in a very long time. Poor thing didn’t have a left foot. Everyone was very sweet to the boy, but we were still unsure about how to act around him.
He was a very polite child, but very rarely did he express emotions on his small, pale face. It made all of us unsure about what annoyed him and what didn’t. Apparently he couldn’t enter his mind and observe to learn magic, at least that was what we thought.
As soon as the light disappeared I realized the authorities must be alerted about this because a demon may have appeared in Ruby’s house. If we thought that anyone might be related to or may be a demon we must contact the police, Tutus. Tutus was the name of the police squad in our kingdom of Lux. The angel’s land was right in the southern part of the continent. It was relatively small so we built our building up into the skies. Of course they were all reinforced by magic or they would all come tumbling down.
So as I ran as quickly as I could to the Tutus station, I thought of the possibility that the officers wouldn’t be able to take care of the demon or whatever it is. What if it was too strong and it began to kill and eat all of us. I could only keep on running to the station to alert of them of the happening.
I quickly alerted them and they then followed me to the house. It was completely demolished and what I thought was Ruby and Toby’s shadows in the blinding light turned out to be their corpses. I looked around to see if I could find the boy, and I then turned my head to see a small young child with no shirt to be lying on the ground. I ran over to him and asked him his name. Apparently it was a good way to tell someone’ s mental status. To make sure they knew who they were.
“Lucifer.” That was his answer. I was about to ask him another question, but as soon as he answered it, he blacked out.
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I barely even noticed the massive black wings sprouting from his back. Everybody seemed to stare at them for a little while before they realized that “Lucifer” needed medical attention. Luckily the Tatus brought a magician with them who could use the magic to support his body. I wondered if the boy knew his parents were dead……
Lucifer POV
When I woke up and saw the sterile, white room, I guessed that the people who saw me brought me to a hospital. My back ached and leg hurt. Probably from whatever happened yesterday. Or whenever it was. I wasn’t quite sure how long I had been asleep.
“Doctor, he’s awake.” Said a nurse that was standing by my bedside. Strange. I didn’t notice him when I woke up.
Suddenly the door opened and a woman with a tan face and steel gray hair walked in.
“So how are you feeling, boy?” She said in a thick accent that made it hard to understand her.
“I’m sore all over.” Which was true. All of my joints ached, much worse than anything I had experienced before. “What happened to me?”
“Your parents are dead.” The doctor said in a tone that along with her accent only increased the tension in the air. Her steel gray eyes bored into me as if looking for any sign of emotion.
“I am not surprised.” I said quietly in the monotone voice I would use everyday and every occasion. Nothing was special about this. My parents died. No big deal. Then for some reason my face felt moist, I then realized that tears were streaming down my face.
“It’s okay. Judging from their injuries, they died quickly. Very little pain.” She said in a way, that I suppose, was supposed to comfort me. But I didn’t want them to die quickly. They couldn’t. After all the pain I went through and they just die. No screaming or crying or begging for mercy. They did not deserve to die that way. They needed to suffer.
I did not believe in God, heaven, hell, basically I’m an atheist. My parents will be greeted with a great void of nothingness and won’t even know they existed because they’re dead. They are no longer anything but a memory. Then I realized why I was crying. I was supposed to be happy my parents were gone, but I felt nothing. My body was subconsciously crying out of the emotions I should’ve felt but didn’t because I could feel them no longer. Maybe I was also crying out of sadness that the people who raised me were gone. It could be either one, but I didn’t know, couldn’t know, because I felt nothing.
“How did they die? Or better yet, what killed them?” I asked calmly in a way that if you didn’t see my face you wouldn't know I was crying. The doctor’s face tightened as though she were surprised. Surprised, probably, that I asked the question or didn’t know.
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“You awakened to magic. It's our best guess that your awakening caused the explosion and the light.” She said and then instantly sealed her mouth and watched for my reaction. Unsurprisingly,she got none from me.
“You said an explosion, but there was no sound.” I said, evidently I only heard the part about “....the explosion and the light.”
“A soundless explosion. It is a common occurrence when children awaken. Although in your case it was larger than usual.” She put great emphasis on the words common and usual, as if there was something she were trying to avoid that was unusual.
“Awaken? I awakened?” I asked puzzled. I had some theories about what happened, but awakening was most certainly not on the list. Not to mention the fact that I couldn’t even enter my mind to observe.
“Yes you did.” She hurriedly said as if trying to avoid the topic altogether. The moment she talked about the incident there had always been a hesitation in her voice not previously there. It was as though she was trying to hide something from me that I needed to know.
“How could I awaken if I could not even enter my mind?” If all the other questions were giving her issues, then I can’t wait to see her response to this one. And I was not let down.
“There is another way you can awaken. It is very brutal though, which is why the Council decided to hide it from the masses.” She was now very fidgety and acted as though every little thing scared her. When I moved or breathed she flinched, nervously. The council was the leader of Lux and was composed of five members that ruled the kingdom as though a king would.
“What other way is there?” I said in my normal monotone voice with more authority than usual.
“Pain. If enough pain is caused the body will forcefully release the magic in it to protect itself.” After she said these words she looked as if a great burden was lifted from her shoulders. She was still tense but not as much as before.
“So enough pain was administered to me that my body forcefully released its magic?”it was a rhetorical question but she still answered.
“Yes, that is what we think. And judging from your scars, you have had more than enough pain.” She said.
“Why haven’t I heard about this before? I doubt I am the first child to be abused.” It was true. Many children had it much worse for them, yet they didn’t awaken.
“You are not the first by any means. It is just that the child you do awaken, many of them do not survive the process and, from what we have learned, it is not just pain that causes you to awaken. You need to be aware that you need to protect yourself and have enough mental capacity to go through the change, in addition to pain. The children to not understand why this happened and usually die because their bodies try to forcefully seal the magic. You are the first case in twenty years that did not relapse into an enormous amount of pain after they reawakened.” She said with a face that showed signs of fear, most likely because I was still in danger of relapsing.
“Do I physically change as the other children would have naturally done?” I wanted to know if any physical changes occurred because I was lying down and it hurt to move my head.
“
Yes you did. You gained a pair of wings,” My face remained the same. I was not in the mood to be surprised, but that did explain why my back hurt so much and the “bed” I was lying on was so uncomfortable. My body was hurting all over and I tried to ignore the doctor but the next thing she said caught my attention,”and a foot.”
Hopefully it was my left one and I didn’t have a random foot somewhere on my body. I didn’t even try to move it. I was so tired at this point,that the only thing i wished for was a good night’s sleep. “Hopefully it was the left one.” She smiled a little when I said that. It made the harsh lines of her elderly face look softer, not that I was going to tell her that.
“It is indeed your left one. Don’t worry. Is there anything you need?” She asked. I’m sure she didn’t want to lose another child to abuse and probably figured I did not have the most comfortable life.
“Yes. Some sleep would be wonderful.” I said, and truthfully that was the only thing I wanted.
“Then I will leave you to it. Though I should mention that a few people will be coming by to check your species, magic attribute, and purity level. And one other thing, you can call me Dr. Niamh.” Dr. Niamh said as she turned to the door to leave.
“My name is Lucifer, nice to meet you.” And that was the last thing I said before I went into a deep slumber in which my restless mind finally found some peace.
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