People usually ask me why I wear this mask all the time. My answer is always the same. To hide my eyes from my fangirls so they don't swoon and faint from my sexiness. Unfortunately, that's only partly true. The mask is to hide my eyes, but for a completely different reason.

When I was younger, my mom always said I had my dad's eyes and was his spitting image. She loved him very much. Sadly, happiness couldn't last forever. I was seven when the event happened. A trainer had challenged the Ecruteak Gym and used a Tyranitar during the battle. The trainer decided to have Tyranitar use Outrage for the final blow, but that was a mistake as after the battle, Tyranitar went on a rampage.

The Dark-type Pokémon crashed through the wall of the gym and made its way into the city. Along with its trainer and the Gym Leader at the time, my dad also tried to stop the Armor Pokémon from hurting anyone. Dad and his Slowking were able to hold off Tyranitar from doing any good amount of damage to the city. Things went downhill from there.

Still in its Outrage, Tyranitar started up a Dragon Claw attack and stampeded towards a young child, who had been frozen in fear. Without even thinking, Dad ran over and pushed the kid out of the way, saving the kid's life…at the cost of his own. The Dragon Claw came down just as Dad pushed the kid out of the way and he took the attack full force.

It was sometime later that the Tyranitar was finally subdued and its trainer charged for what happened, but there was no point of celebrating. When Mom heard what had happened to Dad, she broke down. I had never seen her like that before and I hope never to see her like that again. Lucian became obsessed, for lack of a better term, with books. He and Dad were the same. They loved books and reading. I had asked Lucian once why he always had a book with him if all it would do was remind him of Dad. His answer was simple.

"It's because they remind me of Father that I keep them. One should never forget those they were close to, Will."

Anabel was lucky as she was only two at the time when Dad died so she won't have to remember, yet at the same time, she was unfortunate to grow up without a father, so Lucian and I took it upon ourselves to protect her and watch out for her more than brothers normally would.

As I said earlier, Mom always said I had my dad's eyes before the incident. Not wanting her to be sad anymore, I started to wear the mask I am known for today. She had asked me why I was wearing a mask all of sudden and I had told her…

"If I'm going to be a famous magician one day, I need to hide my identity so my fangirls don't hunt me down and take my things for their shrines of me!"

A stupid thing to say, but Mom seemed to accept that, but I get the feeling she knew the real reason. If she did, she never said anything. One day I might take the mask off for good, but I won't do that until I know for sure that my eyes won't cause Mom any pain from the memories and since I don't want to bring up such memories, I'll probably have to wait for Mom to bring it up.

Until then, my true eyes will remain hidden from the world.

FIN

-:-

Very rarely do I write something so…dark. I think this might be the third time I've written something like this.

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this look into Will's past, even if it was heartwrenching.