"Heh." Damien laughed. He had a long line of spit dribbling slowly towards his younger cousin. He had his big hands on the other boy's shoulders, holding him down, and his knees on either side of his chest. Virgil struggled below him, not strong enough to escape, but strong enough to put up a fight. He kicked futilely. "Why don't you just call your mommy?" He teased, knowing well that Virgil was mute. He had been born that way, and Damien had been taking absolute advantage of it for years.

The scrawny 11-year-old could do nothing now but flinch. No one seemed to be paying attention, and it wasn't time to feed the chickens for another half-hour. He shut his eyes; made sure his mouth was closed especially, and waited for the splat. It hit him right between the eyes.

A few moments later he was free, and trying to get the spit off his forehead. It was specially sticky and smelled worse than usual today. He assumed the other boy had been trying to make his own Maple syrup again. He quietly hoped that Damien would eventually get poison sap. The child unhappily left for the chores. As he walked, tossing out chicken feed here and there, he was surrounded by poultry.

The family Alexandrescu was of farmers, chicken farmers. There were hundreds of the ugly little beasts everywhere, in coops perhaps better than the people's living quarters. But they had been bringing in a good haul for almost eighty years, spanning three generations and surviving two whole different Heterodynes. It had even survived the monsters that shared the outskirts of Mechanicsburg, which was almost as impressive.

"Virgil, get out of the garage!" His father called from the living room, sounding more annoyed than normal. The boy looked up in surprise, banging his head on a pipe and groaning. "Go check the fences!" Virgil groaned again, pushing a hand through his dark greasy hair. His three sisters never had to check the fences. But then again they were only five… He got up, scooting out from under the family wagon. Well, at this point it wasn't a wagon. Thanks to Virgil it was now a high-speed death buggy. He had even written it crudely on the side, despite his mother's enormous protests. Sometimes she regretted teaching that boy to write to communicate.

He had made several 'minor' adjustments, such as the addition of one steam engine under the seat, a flame throwing horn, and the ever popular traffic splitter. That one Virgil was especially proud of. He had been doing this for a while, to all the items he could sneak into the garage. Occasionally he even souped up other people's vehicles just to see the reaction of horror and awe as, say, their wagon torched a goat crossing the road.

At first they had thought the boy was a spark. You could imagine the gratitude to the heavens they felt when it was decided that he wasn't a spark, just a good natural-born mechanic. At least he wasn't another mad boy that would be recruited by the army before he was even thirteen. They figured so long as he got to work there wouldn't be any scary breakthroughs later on in case they were wrong.

The caramel skinned boy left his death buggy, going to fix any broken fences around the perimeter of their three-square kilometer property. If they weren't tight enough foxes, monsters, and Jaegers came in to steal their chickens. They had to feed that army somehow, but it wasn't coming from their farm dammit. He took his favorite weapon- the sickle- off the wall of tools he had collected over the years, slipped it into the straps on his back, and headed out to check the fences.

Skip ahead nine years. Virgil was preparing to take over the chicken farm, as much as he hated the place. No one else could. His mother was old and becoming arthritic, his sisters too young, and Damien was untrustworthy and not directly in line. No one could lay a finger on that boy because of his overwhelming size, and he had been sneaking around lately. No one said a word to him for the sake of avoiding one of his brutish tantrums.

Virgil's father was no longer with them. He had died in the testing of a new clank of the Heterodynes, which had exploded in the town square, two years ago. At least it had done what it had intended to do as a war machine, which was grabbing as many enemies as it could before blowing the whole area to smithereens.

So Virgil Simu Alexandrescu was first in line before his sisters for the farm. But right now he wasn't thinking about responsibility. He was thinking about turning twenty today. His mother had said she had a surprise, and even as an adult it excited him.

"Here you are." She came into the kitchen as he served a breakfast of Belgian waffles to the triplets. He looked up from spooning cinnamon apples over the food when she dropped a large jar of change onto the old table. The young man's dark eyes seemed to brighten. What was this for? He put a hand on the lid, feeling an odd urge to just dig his hands into it. He had never had so much money-

"Not now." The woman smacked his hand away. "This is to pay for your gift." She looked down. "Your father and I have been saving this money for years. It is to buy you a voice."

He frowned, in need of an explanation. "That doctor spark, Herr Diablo, has a breakthrough procedure. He can repair your voice." She grinned. "With this money we can convince him to do it with no other additions!"

Now Virgil could light up. He hugged her. 'Oh, oh thank you!' He looked at the money before picking up the jar, ready to go now.

"Soon." She promised with a laugh at his enthusiasm. "First you will eat and take a bath." He rolled his eyes. He had taken a bath three days ago. But fine, fine. He would do it if it got him a voice sooner. He didn't even sit down scarfed down the waffles as Dana, Mary, and Evelynn followed suit. Before they were even finished he ran to the shower.

Mary, the tallest and spunkiest of the girls, was arguing with Dana (more plump and darker that the others) over who had to lock up the coops when he got out, still drying his hair. "Okay, okay," She chuckled, tucking his muscle shirt into his grey work pants. There was no need for fancy clothing, he was probably just going to get blood on it anyway. With that, he picked up the jar and they left.

The man helped load his family into the still fondly named doom buggy, taking the wheel. His mother was still deathly afraid of it, especially since the machine had gone from shooting up monsters to blowing up barns thanks to its creator. He honked the horn gleefully, making it sputter and belch a three-foot long tongue of flame. He turned and smiled at his mother, meeting her scowl, before pouting and pulling out.

The townspeople parted, used to seeing this piece of destruction roll through town. They got to the corner where the spark waited outside on the cobblestone walk. "Aah!" Herr Diablo grinned. "Come on in. You wanted the voice right?" Virgil nodded. "Are you the subject?" He nodded again as he was led inside a cleanly but small wood paneled room filled with ancient furniture, family following. He began to adjust his goggles before remembering they were part of his face and had been for years. "You know… I can add some other stuff I wanted to test out too-"

"Ahem." His mother pouted, setting the jar on a counter.

"Ooh…" He poked at the jar. "Okay. Just the voice." She tapped the jar again. "Oh, fine, a HUMAN voice." He rolled his eyes. The middle-aged and balding man put an arm around his subject. As they crossed into the lab through a faintly stained screen door, he looked towards the family. "You might want to stay out there."

Virgil swallowed. "Don't worry." Diablo promised. "I know how to use anesthetics!"

After a few hours he let Virgil out of the repurposed experiment chair, grinning. "Success! I think… well, you best go home! Get rest! Come back tomorrow and let me hear you!"

He stumbled out into the living room where his mother was knitting with Evelynn and the other two were asleep. She smiled at seeing his lack of extra limbs and the row of stitches along his throat. He rubbed his neck sorely before smiling.

As they exited the building, helping the still drowsy man into the cart, his mother stroked his wavy hair, her ever withstanding gift of affection. This time Mary got to drive, which worried her even more, but her baby boy was going to talk which was even better.

"Virgil, we're going to do some shopping." She said as traffic began to clear like magic again. "Do you want to come along?"

He shook his head. "The Herr said rest." Dana poked her head from the back seat between them.

The woman nodded. "Okay, Mary, let's go home first."

The man laid down on the couch as soon as he got inside, still smiling faintly as the buggy pulled out again. The man breathed in the musty air of age it gave off, mingling with the smell of well used carpet and poorly varnished wooden walls. He couldn't believe he was going to finally speak… Virgil's eyes began to flutter shut, dreaming of what all he would get to say. Then they snapped open as the squawks of chickens in distress. He sat up quickly, peering out the window just above his head.

There was Damien, exiting the nearest coop with four chickens under his arms. Virgil gasped quietly. He looked down. Should he go stop him? It wasn't the best idea, considering his past of getting beaten up with ridiculous repetitiveness. 'Vell… if hy can speak… maybe he'll be more intimidated?' He thought. Well that was enough reasoning for him.

The man jumped off the couch and ran through the garage and outside, too determined to be sore. He snatched at Damien's collar angrily, making him turn. Virgil pointed to the chickens. "Oh, ha." He smirked. "Yeah, someone's got to sell them to de army since you keep electrifying de fences."

The mechanic narrowed his eyes before rearing back and socking his cousin in the mouth. "Hyu little shit!" He prepared to hit back. Then waited. "Vhy should I beat you op today? Hyu can't tell anyone what I do anyway."

Virgil's eyes narrowed even more deeply. He pointed with a smirk to his still swollen stitches. "Actually…" He coughed up the words much less articulately than he had imagined. But the words were still coming out understandably. "Hy will tell dis time!"

For a moment Damien was in complete shock. Then he dropped the birds, which fled back to their nests, and punched the man back. Virgil didn't have much time to react before the other struck again, and again. He coughed; spat out a small bit of blood into the sun baked dirt, and kicked Damien in the knee.

The other man's knee buckled, but he backed up. For a moment the brunette rubbed his leg sorely before launching himself again, tackling Virgil ferociously. He pulled his fists together and hammered on his cousin's chest and arms. "I'll-" He panted between blows. "Teach! Hyu! To! Be! A! Goody two-shoes!"

Virgil groaned and began to worm from beneath the raging cousin's grasp. This only earned him a hit in the ear. Damien got up, allowing Virgil to breathe just long enough to realize he was seeing stars. Then he punted him right in the ribs. This elicited a wonderful gasp and he continued, circling as he did so to break as many ribs and bruise as much flesh as possible.

The mechanic whined quietly. He hurt too much to stand, barely managing to roll onto his belly and clenching up, trying to avoid a blow that could seriously cripple him. Damien planted a shoe in his ass a few more times.

After a few more minutes of beating Virgil, he became bored. He couldn't get him to open up from the turtle position and had sufficiently bruised most everything he could reach. He had even guaranteed his cousin at least three broken ribs.

The man just grunted and began to walk away. Virgil struggled to sit up, sticking his neck out to breathe heavily. Damien turned. He narrowed his muddy brown eyes at the stitches, clearly defined and still swollen. "Hyu are not going to tell." Before he could realize what Damien had even said and tuck his head back under, he came back and kicked Virgil as hard as he could in the throat.

He collapsed again. Damien ran off as Virgil gasped like a fish, struggling to breathe and not being able too as blood poured from his split stiches. He wheezed loudly, too sore and too afraid of blood loss to move. He shut his eyes, focusing through the searing pain and need to sleep, on surviving.

He was found less than half an hour later. His sisters carried him inside, desperately placing ice and bandages over the wounds, knots, and bruises. He gagged. "I think he's going to live." Dana said.

"Virgil who did dis?" His mother asked. She already knew, it was common sense, that Damien was the trouble maker who would beat the shit out of her son in the middle of the chicken yard. It was the busted stitches that bothered her. That surgery was what they had been working for for so long, and if it was ruined thanks to Virgil getting into a fight… he would be ruined.

He tried to speak, despite still barely being able to breathe. "…" He opened his mouth a few times before firmly shutting it again, unable to make noise other than a faint whistle. She stroked his hair very gently.

For the next few days he remained in bed. The spark came in to look, and told them what had been done ruined the work. He offered to try again, but Vigil turned him down. He wasn't afraid that Herr Diablo would foul up and give him wings like he had wanted to before- though he probably would and then some- but he just didn't want his voice back.

Having lay there for days in recovery, Virgil was given time to think about what he had done. The first thing he did with a voice was go out, knowingly endangering such a fragile surgery already, and then got into a fight with someone who was well versed in the administration of beatings. He had tried to be a hero.

So did he really deserve a voice if he could only do something stupid with it? He thought no.