Numb: Redux

Summary: RE-WRITE. Eden Sullivan was born with an inability to feel. She refers to her problem as Numb and she's lived her whole life in a state of unfeeling. Since she can remember she's felt disconnected, the failure of her sense of touch keeping her from emotionally connecting with others as well. Until she cuts a deal with the one and only Spot Conlon.

December, 1899

Anesthetized, apathetic, asleep, benumbed, brutal, callous, cantankerous, churlish, cold, cold fish, cold-blooded, cold-hearted, cool cat, crotchety, cruel, deadened, exacting, feelingless, hard, hardened, heartless, icy, inanimate, inhuman, insensate, insensible, insensitive, iron-hearted, merciless, obdurate, pitiless, ruthless, sensationless, senseless, severe, stony, surly, thick-skinned, tough, unamiable, uncaring, uncompassionate, uncordial, unemotional, unkind, unsympathetic.

All the words above were synonyms to one word, unfeeling. Numb. That is exactly the type of person I am.

There are few words to explain my 'condition', as my mother used to call it before she died. My father never called it anything because he went to jail before my mother even gave birth to me. I just called it being Numb. Nothing more, nothing less than those four letters. I didn't really care to explain any more or less of it, either, to be quite honest. The inability to feel physical sensations left my range of emotion rather lacking.

I was born by the name of Eden Sullivan. When I was four, my mother died and I was sent to an orphanage with my brother, who eventually ran away from it-leaving me to fend for myself. Without a family, it was easier to be disconnected from others. Having no one who cared about me made it easier not to care about anyone in return, especially given my numbness.

I'll be honest, I'm not entirely sure how I made it through my childhood alive. I couldn't feel hunger, so I had to force myself to remember to eat. I only knew I skipped too many meals when my body would begin to slow down, when my mind got foggy, and quite a few times I had feinted from the lack of sustenance. Always, some kind stranger would find me, get food into me, and for that I guess I felt some sort of gratitude. I think it was those moments of giving that let me keep some of my humanity. While I was unable to tell if I was taking care of myself, others would comment, "You're looking thin, have you eaten?" To which I would shrug and promptly find food to shove into my mouth.

It was as if I did not have a survival instinct. No pain or hunger to tell my brain that something was wrong. I felt no comfort or discomfort, no pleasure. I would think it odd if I had ever known anything different. But, I did not. Sometimes it felt like I was only existing as a ghost, seeing everything but unable to connect.

It didn't help, either, that while my sense of touch was compromised, my other senses were not. Much like a blind person having heightened senses while being unable to see, it did feel as though my body were trying to compensate because I could hear, smell, see, and taste in incredible detail and distances. This was both a blessing and a curse because the constant assault to these other senses only seemed to alienate me more from the people around me. After I ran away from the orphanage, I sought out any quiet places that allowed me a reprieve from New York's bustling energy. Much of my childhood and early teens were spent in places such as churches, cemeteries, and my personal favorite, the Astor Library. Although the hours were limited at the library, it offered me a safe area where I managed to teach myself to read with help from any of the women who were working.

All that aside, I probably could have escaped to the country where the noise of the city didn't overwhelm me, but although I stepped foot in the train stations a few times, I could not convince myself to leave. There was something about this fast world, the energy that I couldn't feel but that I knew was there-like the cloudy days where you can't see the sun but it's still so bright-that kept me enthralled and in the city.

Somehow I made it to sixteen years old, without the guidance of a family and by the kindness of strangers. Sighing, I leaned back on my hands as I gazed at the East River, the sun slowly descending behind me, casting shadows along the docks. My hair blew back, but I could not feel the touch of the wind or the coldness of December that so many others consistently complained about. I did, however, keep myself bundled up. I had lost a toe when I was younger to frost bite and since I knew the effects of extreme hot and colds from my research at the library, I had to take care of this shell the best that I could without the nerve signals everyone else had the privilege of.

It was exhausting, really, trying to remember to take care of each limb and appendage on your body without the warnings. Normal people were so very lucky, I silently mused. They didn't even know it.

To the left of me, a couple docks down, a whistle split the air, piercing my ears to the point of pain-the only pain I could feel was through my other senses. It was incredibly odd to understand pain in some aspects but not in others. I could not tell you the amount of books on science I had poured over to find one that mentioned the loss of feeling. It was common enough to find articles and journals on the deaf, blind, and mute. But, no one had ever even mentioned what I had.

The closest I had come was an interesting experiment not of touch, but of language. In the 13th century the Holy Emperor Frederick II had raised infants without human interaction-touch, talking, and suckling-in order to ascertain if there were a true language.

None of the children survived. Without human touch, every single one of them died. I found this incredible. If I could not feel, then why was it that I had survived infancy? My mother had touched me and suckled me, had loved me as much as she was capable while being confused as to why I never cried when I was hungry or when I banged my head on the bed post in our first apartment or a hundred other times I never reacted to something the right way. It made me wonder if I could feel, if her love had gotten me through infancy but that my brain did not understand the signals of touch and therefore, did not process them correctly.

A figure jumping down from a pile of crates distracted me from my internal questioning. Through the waning light of day, I could almost perfectly make him out as he tapped his cane and stood waiting as a smaller boy came running down the dock they were on and stopping just a foot or so away. My ears twitched as I picked up the words between the two who were, judging from their cabby hats and ragged clothes, newsboys.

"Jack's on his way with the Walkin' Mouth. They'se half way across da Brooklyn Bridge."

"What's buggin' him?" The one with the cane asked, his eyes scanning the area, and I laid back on the docks to hide in the shadows. I watched his eyes scan over the area I was at and almost held my breath, but they continued on as if they saw nothing.

"Not shoah. Some of the Manhattaner's tawkin' like he's gotta sistah. That he's lookin' foah her. But, no one's evah hoid of Jack Kelly havin' a sistah."

At the name, I almost sat up, but even if I couldn't physically feel, I did have a gut instinct and it was screaming at me to remain hidden. So, I listened as I always do when it came to instinct. It was the closest I came to feeling and I did not take that for granted.

I watched the boy with the cane and I knew who this was but, oh god, why couldn't I remember his name? He was the leader, his name utterly ridiculous and not at all intimidating and yet, often spoken in an almost reverent, hushed tone. Damn. Spark? Speck? I knew it was an 'S'-He spoke, his voice distracting me with its deepness, "Jacky-boy doesn't tawk about her with many people." The way he said those words made it clear this news came as no surprise. "I'll meet him at the lodgin' house, go let Flit know."

"Yessir." The boy replied as he immediately took off to give Cane-boy's orders.

A few minutes passed as Cane-boy stood there, silently gazing off into nothing before heading down the docks, back towards the city and away from me. I listened to his footsteps until they were gone before sitting back up.

Jack Fucking Kelly was looking for me.

I waited by the East River for another ten minutes, that one sentence reiterating itself in my mind before I stood up to head home. As I stepped off the docks, my boots hitting dry land for the first time since that morning, I pulled up short as I caught sight of the figure waiting there.

He was leaning against the closest street lamp, his hands in his coat pocket, his cane leaning beside him, easily within reach of any sudden attack. I glanced down to see his shadow thrown across the cobblestone, a part of me curious in spite of myself. People did not usually interest me. Books on science were interesting. History was fascinating. Events that shaped who we had become in the last few hundred years were thought-provoking or downright wrong but still a better read than-than discussing things with people alive right now.

The small bit of human in me, though-the one that I rarely listened to-the one that yearned to feel, who desired a connection to someone, anyone, for once overpowered all the logic in my brain and managed to take swift control at the opportunity to participate in human interaction.

Cane-boy (damn what was his name?!) pulled his hat off and ran a hand through his hair as he brought his eyes around to meet mine, "What's a doll like you doin' wearin' trousers and hangin' around the docks?" He asked, causing that bit of human in me to shrink away as my pride bristled at anyone making assumptions and questioning what I did.

The number of years I had no one to answer to far outweighed those spent with my family. I did not like that he expected a reason, as if I owed him that. I made that clear as I scoffed and turned away to leave.

"Ya want me ta tell Jack where ya are?"

I halted.

Two, three, four heartbeats passed between us before I slowly spun on the heel of my boot to once again face him. My breath caught as I found he'd taken a few steps closer to me, but the distance between us was still a good foot or so. However, his nearness wasn't what gave me pause. It was simply him, the light of the flickering oil lamp above us casting both light and shadows upon his features in a way that looked as if they were dancing upon his face. His hair fell onto his forehead and looked soft, the color of brass, bringing to mind the only comparable thing-the paintings of angels I'd seen on the ceilings of the churches I'd been in. Not to mention the blue of those eyes. Absolutely striking. Like a bolt of lightning. Of all things in nature I found fascinating, lightning was by far my favorite. I had too often thought of what would happen if I walked outside during a storm and let a strike find me. Would it jolt awake the nerves of my body, bring me to life in a way I had never been before?

"I've no idea what you're talking about." I said, even as I knew my silence had stretched on too long to possibly be a believable denial.

He flicked back the hair on his forehead. "Shoah ya do. Jack's lookin' foah ya. Ya want me ta tell him ya here in Brooklyn, or send him off on a fool's errand?"

Watching my every move, his face blank and emotionless, he stood waiting for my answer, "Either way, what's in it for you?" I finally asked, registering the flit of surprise he showed at my question. Or perhaps it was because I didn't deny it any further. It was hard to tell, though, but his ability to control his emotions so tightly peaked my interest even more.

The smallest smirk pulled up the corner of his mouth, "I like collectin'...shall we say, debts."

I immediately imagined him with a paper bound journal similar to a bookies' who kept record of bets and I could only guess at what kind of favor this odd newsboy would call in. "And if I ask you to do neither? If I do not care what you tell Jack? You cannot possibly in-debt me to you if I do not care of the outcome of this little event."

That smirk appeared again as he slipped his hat back on his head, "That's true." He grabbed his cane and turned to leave but stopped as he heard my voice.

"Wait." He didn't turn, only waited as I had commanded, "Don't tell him I'm here." It was a snap decision, I hadn't really given myself time to weigh my options or think about what I was getting myself into, I only knew I wasn't ready to see my brother. Not yet.

He nodded before he half turned back to meet my gaze, "Deal."

I watched him walk away, heading towards the Newsboy Lodging House where he would meet up with my brother. The one I hadn't talked to since I was four years old. The one I hadn't seen since the summer when his face had been plastered on the front page of the Sun Newspaper, declaring him leader of the strike and not Francis Sullivan but rather a stranger to me named Jack Kelly.

Sighing again, I turned to head home before thinking better of it. It was always a good idea to make sure others followed through on their side of the bargain. Instead of heading to my apartment in Williamsburg, I changed directions and followed Cane-boy.

A/N: So, I'm re-writing Numb because I wrote the original when I was sixteen, I think? And my writing has gotten a LOT better in ten years and I thought it was time to come back and improve it. I'm leaving the old one up in case you want to take a look at that versus this one but I think there will be a lot of major differences. I want to explore Eden's condition a bit more as well as write a few chapters from an outside perspective. Also, I'm not sure I'll keep Nine, because let's face it he didn't do anything for the original plot, and perhaps the house she gets kicked out of because that whole thing didn't really make too much sense. Anywho, review and tell me if you like this first chapter!

Truly,

Joker is Poker with a J~

Disclaimer: Everything that is familiar to you belongs to either Disney or me from the previous version of this work lol.