Everything Changes, Part 2: 2 of 2
In a small room, in a burning city, a boy cries.
Soon, he will have to get up.
Soon he will have to face the world.
Soon he will have to try to fight demons and villains and old and new enemies.
Soon.
Right now, he is lost in himself, in his sorrow and pain and fear, in his horror at what he has done.
For the first time ever, he has killed a man.
He killed a human being in the midst of a fight against demons. He knows it must have ben a trick, a man somehow switched at the last moment with the demon he knows he saw, but that doesn't change what he did.
He has never taken a life before and he always thought he could find another way. even when things seemed darkest and most violent, he found other ways, other chances. Suddenly, with no warning, everything is different. The whole world, seemingly in chaos, now is revolving around this simple idea... he killed a man.
Heroes don't kill.
It is a rule he has always known and always kept to.
It is right, and he knows it, feels it to his bones. And now he has killed a man and it feels like... he is tainted, made less, and somehow... broken. Tears haven't stopped. It seems like he has been crying for days, or longer. He isn't even sure, really, how long he has been in this room. He found it in a ruined building, somewhere high, secluded, and far from where he had been.
He did kill! But now he had. What could he do and how could he deal with something like that?
He doesn't know, and so he cries.
It is long hours later when he hears a cry for help. His tears have subsided some, mostly for lack of moisture, and he lays on his side, even after he hears the cry. After all, he isn't a hero anymore. Heroes don't kill. Someone else can save her, someone else will. In the next minute he hears something else though, something that freezes his blood.
The laughter of demons.
A surge of anger fills him. And he rises. The next instant he has spoken the word, and even as he rises on a stream of willpower, he knows the demons tricked him, he knows he has to stop them, and he knows he will.
He also knows that no matter what else the Wisdom of Solomon tells him, he will never be completely the same again. He has killed a man and that isn't going to go away.
He arrows through the night, to save a woman and to get back to doing his job. For the first time ever, he doesn't take joy in the flight. It is just part of his duty, part of his job. part of what he has to do.
He flies off towards the woman crying out. To get to work in a job that has lost it's joy.
Soon, he will have to get up.
Soon he will have to face the world.
Soon he will have to try to fight demons and villains and old and new enemies.
Soon.
Right now, he is lost in himself, in his sorrow and pain and fear, in his horror at what he has done.
For the first time ever, he has killed a man.
He killed a human being in the midst of a fight against demons. He knows it must have ben a trick, a man somehow switched at the last moment with the demon he knows he saw, but that doesn't change what he did.
He has never taken a life before and he always thought he could find another way. even when things seemed darkest and most violent, he found other ways, other chances. Suddenly, with no warning, everything is different. The whole world, seemingly in chaos, now is revolving around this simple idea... he killed a man.
Heroes don't kill.
It is a rule he has always known and always kept to.
It is right, and he knows it, feels it to his bones. And now he has killed a man and it feels like... he is tainted, made less, and somehow... broken. Tears haven't stopped. It seems like he has been crying for days, or longer. He isn't even sure, really, how long he has been in this room. He found it in a ruined building, somewhere high, secluded, and far from where he had been.
He did kill! But now he had. What could he do and how could he deal with something like that?
He doesn't know, and so he cries.
It is long hours later when he hears a cry for help. His tears have subsided some, mostly for lack of moisture, and he lays on his side, even after he hears the cry. After all, he isn't a hero anymore. Heroes don't kill. Someone else can save her, someone else will. In the next minute he hears something else though, something that freezes his blood.
The laughter of demons.
A surge of anger fills him. And he rises. The next instant he has spoken the word, and even as he rises on a stream of willpower, he knows the demons tricked him, he knows he has to stop them, and he knows he will.
He also knows that no matter what else the Wisdom of Solomon tells him, he will never be completely the same again. He has killed a man and that isn't going to go away.
He arrows through the night, to save a woman and to get back to doing his job. For the first time ever, he doesn't take joy in the flight. It is just part of his duty, part of his job. part of what he has to do.
He flies off towards the woman crying out. To get to work in a job that has lost it's joy.