{oOo}
The Maiden of Stone
{oOo}
Silver eyes regarded the blindfolded and huddled little girl that the Marines had brought before him.
"She is Medusa?" rumbled Ferrus, addressing the Brother Sergeant attached to that squad still gazing at the young girl, his face unreadable.
The Sergeant nodded, "Our Librarian felt her… awakening."
Ferrus raised an eyebrow in curiosity, the Sergeant grimaced subtly and gestured to one of his men to guide the girl out of her earshot, "It seems that her first power is quite strongly connected to her eyes, hence the blindfold, and when it activated some three days ago she turned a cousin of hers into solid stone."
His Primarchs' eyes widened slightly at this.
"So you can understand her emotional state at this point in time," the Marine added.
"Indeed…" Ferrus' voice was thoughtful, before he waved the Marine looming over Bia, who led her over. Ferrus crouched and placed a hand lightly on the child's grey hair, making her flinch, and said, "We'll be taking you somewhere you can train, so your eyes won't hurt anybody again," he tried to sound reassuring, and wasn't sure if he had succeeded.
"…Really?" Bia's voice was small and almost unheard.
{oOo}
Bia remembered the day when her powers activated. She was only five and upset that her cousin took her doll. The next moment, his hand was turning to stone and—she had cried when that happened and wouldn't open her eyes later. Mother gave her a blindfold.
Just three days later, the Iron Hands showed up and took her away. She went to Terra to learn how to be Senshi Medusa. At the end of her training, Ferrus Manus and Magnus the Red approached her and gave her her glasses.
"They will help you control your powers," Ferrus Manus had said.
"I made sure that they will suppress them myself," Magnus had added.
They had worked. Her powers never got out of control again.
And then one day, as she was escorting Magnus the Red to his brother, a Scout bumped into her. She stumbled forward noticing too late that the glasses slipped of her nose.
"M-my glasses!" Bia cried, screwing her eyes shut. She heard a crunch and with a sinking feeling, realized that the scout who bumped into her must have not managed to slow down and ran over them. The glasses lay only a few meters away bent and broken.
"You don't need them," Magnus said, placing his large hand on her shoulder.
The girl remained unresponsive, not daring to even glance. She'd seen what happened when she looked at anything unprotected. She couldn't risk opening them. "But nothing-!"
"It was you," Magnus said. "You believed they worked and they did. Now you just need to believe that you can control your power without them.
{oOo}
AN: Collabed by Nico Hana and Bloody Mary.