Title: Letters from the Sky
Author: WhyIsARavenLikeAWritingDesk
Fandom: I Am Number Four, 2011
Characters: Henri, John, Sarah, Sam, Number Six, Mark/OC
Rating: T – M
Disclaimer: I do not own I Am Number Four. Everything belongs to their respective owners.
Summary: On Lorien, one is never whole unless both sides of the coin are accounted for. On Earth, one is just never whole. The Number Fours will change that.
Nobody tells you about the lies, or the running, or the danger. No one mentions how hard it is. How tiring this kind of life can be. It's lonely. It's terrifying. We've been running for so long, I can hardly remember a time when I wasn't on the move. I've been to more places than I can count. I've had more "friends" than are worth trying to remember. I've felt no love, no compassion, no pity, no kinship with the people we cross paths with. They aren't like us and we aren't like them.
When my brother and I were three our home planet, Lorien, was destroyed by the Mogadorians. They slaughtered our people like livestock and sucked our planet dry. Our parents were among the elite group of Guards that were wiped out in the initial invasion. The Mogs stole everything from me and my brother. Our parents, our home, our lives. We were among the lucky few to survive. Only nine children and their assigned protectors made it off the planet alive.
In mine and my brother's case, our protector, Henri, got a bit more than he signed up for. Having twins on Lorien is practically unheard of. Having a boy and girl set of twins has never been witnessed in our history. We are the first, and, if I am truthful, we are most likely the last. Henri was assigned Child Number Four. No one told this that Child Number Four was actually a set of twins. On our home world, we would not be considered two separate people. On Lorien we would have been the same. One soul in two bodies, two sides of the same coin. Black and white, hot and cold. We would never be whole without the other right there beside us.
Here on Earth, it's not the same. They try to separate us. Henri has to explain over and over again that we can't function without the other. The humans think it's crippling for us to rely on each other so much. We ignore them the best we can. When we reached the right age, Henri started to send us to school. He says it's so we don't raise suspicions when we have to move again. I think it's because Henri feels the need to give us some kind of normalcy. Whatever the reason, my brother and I don't argue.
We do, however, argue about why we have to move. Since I am the more reserved and passive one, you can imagine that my brother is the outgoing and aggressive type. He's always pulling some stunt or another that sets off alarms with other people, or that gets posted to the internet. And we have to move. Because, in our lives, it's run or die. Henri tells my brother to be more like me, to stay out of sight. While I agree that sometimes my brother can be a bit much, I do not want him to be like me. He is the other side of me that I just cannot bring out. He is my other half.
We were nine years old when Number One died. The burning in my arm has been the worst pain I've ever felt. My brother and I have the matching scars to prove that all of the surviving children shared that pain. We were twelve when Number Two died. My brother was in the middle of a school spelling bee. We felt that same pain, burning us from the inside out, and we just knew. We moved that night.
We're in Florida now. It's this small, tourist-free town, a village really, and it's peaceful. We've been here a few months and so far my brother hasn't done anything stupid. He's managed to lay low and be quite invisible. I feel that won't last long, not with the way he looks at some of the girls on the beach. It'll just be a matter of time before he pulls some stupid stunt to impress some girl. Just a matter of time.