"Jason." A quick flutter of light crackled through the darkness.
"Jason! come on." The darkness retreated, revealing a beautiful woman...
"Jason! Wake up!"
I came to, shot up from my desk and stared face to face with a gray haired woman. Not so beautiful after all, I thought.
"Are we going to have another one of these years?" Said a sarcastic Ms. Broton, my biology teacher. "Try not to fall asleep in the future." I heard laughter echo all around me from the fifteen other students in my Freshman "Introduction to Biology" class. I peeked behind me at Kelly, who sat covering her mouth with a delicate hand.
I slouched back into my desk and scribbled something down in my notebook about the mitochondria ("It's the powerhouse of the cell," was how Ms. Broton described it). I discreetly pulled out my phone and found, unsurprisingly, no notifications.
Four hours later I was trudging home in the rain, mud splashing up against my light gray boots turning them a dirty brown. Gray clouds rained down freezing rain onto my sweatshirt-clad back. I had forgotten my coat at home that day and was living with the consequences.
But even the rain couldn't depress me any more than usual, it was Friday and I had a long weekend ahead of me. I planned to be up until six in the morning and sleep until six in the evening, it would be glorious.
I walked up my building's front steps and buzzed my apartment, "Who is it?" My mom asked through the intercom.
"It's me, Mom." She buzzed me up.
My mom was a cheery woman of forty, with curly brown hair with barely-noticeable gray mixed in. She would always tell me I was lucky I inherited my father's bright blond hair instead of hers, which she considered "boring." She wore big glasses and smiled a lot.
I said "hi," gave her a hug, and began to rush to my room, as was my ritual. She stopped me, "There's a package upstairs for you, one of your friends dropped it off earlier today."
Friends? I thought, What friends? I shrugged and shut my door. My walls were covered in posters, all in Japanese (which I was learning because subtitles are always awful), and all of anime. I smiled at my Levi poster, he looked so badass. He was short, like me, but our similarities ended at that. I wouldn't last a day outside of Wall Rose. I couldn't kill a titan for shit. Also, and most depressingly, Levi wasn't real.
I looked down at my bed where a small gray package was sitting on my blue bedspread. I peeled off the packaging tape and opened up the cardboard flaps. I pulled out the bubble wrap, casually popping a few bubbles, and saw what lay inside.
It was a beautiful ring with a blue stone sitting in the middle. It glittered and reflected the light, burning my eyes. I had to re-angle it so it didn't flash. I slipped it on my finger and instantly recoiled. It burned like fire.
I moved my other hand to take it off, but I couldn't get a hold on it. The ring was dissolving quickly into my right ring finger, making it feel like my hand was dissolving with it. The blue stone sucked in, and a bright blue light shone from my hand. It pierced my skin like a brilliant star against the sky. My hand opened and closed automatically. I felt the rush of pain, yet at the same time another rush, as if I was getting stronger. I felt like I could do anything. It moved down my finger, across and into the center of my palm. It flashed incredibly bright for a split second before dimming and going out entirely. I sat there stunned, unable to think or breathe. I noticed it had stopped burning. And then, before i had recovered, my eyes closed and I sank to the floor.