I know I'm always like
Telling everybody, "You don't gotta be a victim
Life ain't always fair, but hell is living in resentment
Choose redemption, your happy ending's up to you"

-Learn to Let Go; by Kesha

10 Years Earlier

"Kayleigh, I will ask you one more time - what did you do?" Mr. Haymond, the principal of Kayleigh's middle school, looked at the thirteen year old firmly. Sitting beside the young girl was her mother, Avery Ortiz. Avery had been called out of work because of an incident involving her daughter - a supposed "fight", though witnesses said that Kayleigh didn't even lift a finger against her assailant. The girl Kayleigh faced off with, Bianca Wilkerson, had been bullying Avery's daughter for quite some time, that was what Mr. Haymond had been told. Bianca tried starting something before first period, and that was when Kayleigh attacked. As far as anyone was concerned, whatever happened between the two girls before first period, resulted in Bianca needing to receive both medical and psychiatric attention. Mr. Haymond let out a sigh through his nose, his brown eyes flickering to Avery before glancing back at the young girl. "Do you understand what you did?" he asked, his tone clipped. "You put another student in the hospital. Whatever you did to Bianca Wilkerson, it is costing her and her family greatly."

"Kayleigh, if you don't say what you did...," Avery started, her voice sharp.

"She got scared." Kayleigh's voice caught the two adults off guard. "Bianca got scared, so I used it against her. I made her see things. A lot of things. Did you know her father's an alcoholic? Or that her brother does heroin?" The girl's greenish brown eyes flickered between principal and mother. "That scares her. It really does. Her father gets violent when he's drunk, and her brother lashes out when he's high. Bianca's mother left when she was a baby, did you know that? Bianca's got a lot of anger towards her mother, so I used that against her, too. I didn't do anything to her, except make her face her feelings."

Avery and Mr. Haymond looked at Kayleigh for a long moment. The statement alone was enough to have their own fear and uncertainty radiate off them in waves. Kayleigh could feel it, she could practically taste it. Her ability to sense the emotions - particularly fear and anger - came out of nowhere one day. It had been two weeks ago when the sensation arose. It was during lunch, when Kayleigh was talking to her friends Vicky and Shaun. The sensation hit her like a freight train, and it hadn't shut off since. It was like sensory overload, and most days the young girl found herself unable to really focus on anything else.

Anger and fear seemed to be the strongest emotions Kayleigh could sense. The others - happiness, sadness, loneliness, etc. - were less prominent, thereby less important in the eyes of the young girl. Kayleigh began using her ability to see what everyone's fear was, what made everyone mad. It was only until the confrontation with Bianca that she came to realize her power of emotional manipulation.

"I know that you, Mr. Haymond, hold a great amount of resentment towards your estranged wife," Kayleigh said. "She cheated on you with your brother, and she filed for divorce not long after you found out. She moved in with him a week after, and from the looks of it, everything will be given to her once the divorce is finalized."

The principal's face paled, looking at the thirteen year old with an expression of true horror.

Kayleigh looked over at her mother. "I know you're scared of Ricki leaving you," she responded. "No one likes him, which makes you even more scared. You want people to like him. But it's his personality, his overall attitude, that makes people hate him so much. He knows it, too. He doesn't like where he's at - forced to raise some woman's kids, who wants that? He's being held back, in his mind. There's so much he could be doing. Ricki's mad at you. He's mad at us, your kids..."

"Kayleigh, that's enough," Mr. Haymond snapped. His voice was trembling slightly, the fear coming from him had thickened, and the young girl could practically see it coming off him.

"Why? You asked what I did." The young girl looked at her principal unblinkingly. "I demonstrated to you what I could do. At least, what I can partially do. Bianca was weak. So are you, and so is my mother. So is everyone." She pursed her lips. "Fear is common among everyone," she said quietly. "It's easy to manipulate if you know what to do. I don't know quite yet, but I'll get there."

Present Day

It was definitely different, looking back to when she was a kid. Back when she was inexperienced. Kayleigh Montgomery, at thirteen, first came to realize she could manipulate emotions, her favorite being fear and anger. As it would turn out, that kind of ability had a name - illusion casting, because she could make one's deepest fears or angers come to life; she's even heard the term "hallucikinesis". Was that even a word? Just by saying the word, Kayleigh snickered a little. Hallucikinesis was certainly something she'd never heard before, but it was also a word she liked to associate herself with. To be able to make someone vividly hallucinate whatever emotion a memory was attached to made her feel a little giddy inside.

About four years after Kayleigh discovered her manipulative ability, she discovered her telekinetic ability. In all honesty, the young girl felt as if it was too much, giving her telekinesis. Being able to stop everyone's emotions from overwhelming her was one thing, but having to teach herself to stop destroying everything without touching it was another. Unfortunately, the amount of time it had taken for Kayleigh to completely tune out the emotions that would rattle in her head took a toll on her. By the time she reached eighteen, she could partially ignore the emotions. By twenty, she could tune them out somewhat, but it wasn't enough. She could still feel them inside her, and it was driving her crazy - literally. Having to feel what everyone felt, having to see the memories attached to those emotions, was causing Kayleigh's mental health to steadily deteriorate. She was finding it hard to differentiate between reality and memory. By the time she was twenty one, Kayleigh was admitted to a psychiatric ward. She considered herself a danger to herself and to others, so she stayed there for a year and a half, being stuffed with medication that didn't actually work. She had to pretend to be OK.

By the time Kayleigh was twenty three, she took a moment to really reflect on what was going on in her life. She had been discharged from the psych ward, she was weening herself off her medication. Kayleigh remembered, the day she caused Bianca Wilkerson to go to the hospital, her mother and Mr. Haymond decided it'd be best to have her removed from the school. Avery Ortiz thought that Kayleigh's behavior was disturbing enough to have her see a therapist, who believed that the young girl may have some kind of schizophrenia. Avery didn't want to believe it - how could Kayleigh be schizophrenic? She knew things no kid her age should know about. The therapist tried to rationalize it, tried coming up with explanations, but there was nothing about the diagnosis that made sense to Avery. But she went with it, she gave Kayleigh the medication but there was no improvement. By the time Kayleigh turned eighteen, she was kicked out of the house. Supposedly, Avery was tired of her eldest daughter "terrorizing" - both literally and figuratively - the family. Ricki Daniels, Avery's boyfriend, ended up leaving her because of his discomfort around Kayleigh. Keyleigh's younger siblings were scared to be near her without their mother present.

By eighteen, the young girl was trying to balance out her emotional manipulation plus her newfound ability of telekinesis. Being on the street, how was she supposed to do that? She had no idea what to do, no way of properly understanding what was wrong with her. When she was younger, Kayleigh thought of her abilities as some kind of gift, but as she grew older, she didn't see them that way anymore. Feeling what everyone was feeling, being unable to control her telekinesis - it was too much for her. At eighteen, Kayleigh did consider suicide. Just to make everything stop. She couldn't. She hated herself for months afterward.

By twenty, when she could partially tune out the emotions of others, Kayleigh did manage to get some control over her telekinesis - not a lot, but some. It was better than nothing, in her mind. It was progress. There were moments where, whenever Kayleigh found herself in a stressful situation, her telekinesis would explode and she'd damage whatever was in her vicinity. That only furthered her need to control herself.

At twenty three, after leaving the psych ward, once she was weened off her medication, Kayleigh started to really practice. She tried meditation to calm down the swirling emotions. She tried yoga to help with that plus the telekinesis. She tried becoming a vegetarian - anything that would help better herself physically and mentally. Kayleigh couldn't allow herself to be overtaken by her powers. She couldn't let them control her anymore.

Now, at twenty five, Kayleigh Montgomery was improving. Her mental health was still effected from her manipulative ability, but it wasn't as bad as it once was. Her telekinesis was still under construction, but it was better than it was at eighteen. Kayleigh was going to do better for herself and everyone around her. She owed them that much.

(A/N):

What'd you think of this chapter? Was it good? Was it bad? Was it meh? I know it may seem a bit rushed, or even a little sloppy, but - I don't know - this was kind of rolling around in my head for a bit so I decided to give it a try. Let me know if there's anything that needs improvement.

MCU does not belong to me. I own Kayleigh + any other OCs I add to the story; and any subplots I put in.

Constructive criticism is welcome.

Thanks.

Raeven Belmonte