Word count: 7,873

Published: September 25, 2017

Edited: slight edits done on August 18, 2018

Edited By: N/A

Playlist: Everything Ends Here by BlueLionsMusic (more so towards the end of chapter)

My hesitation only lasted a second before I stiffly rapped my shaking fist on the office door the gym receptionist lead me to when she signed me in for my five o'clock meeting. The hesitation on my part was uncalled for; pathetic. I needed this just as much as I needed food in my stomach and air in my lungs. I couldn't keep going forward with how things were operating now; I needed this change.

And my hesitation only strengthened my resolve.

I could do this.

My disease will not beat me!

Not anymore.

A loud bang resounded behind the closed door after I knocked in rapped concession, followed closely by a well-timed curse.

"Uh," I started, my voice rising so I could be heard through the door, "is this a bad time? I can come back"-I faltered briefly as my thoughts ran through my evening's schedule out of habit, despite it not making a difference-"another time when you're . . . available." I lied, knowing full well I wouldn't come back if I happened to be turned away from an appointment I arrived to with only a minute to spare. That was just rude.

"Wait! Hold on . . . just . . . one . . . " he grunted loudly before another bang boomed behind his closed office door, jolting me away with a little hop of alarm. Slowly, I backed up, ready to hightail it out of there but before I could even turn and make a mad dash to the exit, the door finally opened, revealing a bare-chested, well-built (holy mother of abs!) man in gray sweats that hung loosely around his hips (and below chiseled, well-defined abs!), accenting the tone muscle that lie just beneath the scandalously low waistband (and more delicious abs!) and . . . purple sparkles decorating his sweat-clad blonde hair.

Besides the oddly placed purple sprinkles in his hair, the man before me was downright gorgeous, in a rouge boyish way, and here was I, my puggy self, ogling him like a fat dog in heat.

He was panting heavily as his bright blue eyes regarded me with cool interest, unaware of the sparkles twinkling in his hair and falling dramatically down the side of his soft yet angular jaw in wisps of rebellion that contrasted greatly with his calculative stare.

Or maybe he did know and just didn't care . . . or was into that sort of thing.

Unwarranted images popped into my mind of the things he may have been doing behind that closed door before I knocked, making me take a subconscious step back from the gorgeously tuned man.

And just like everyone else I'd ever met in the last five years, his gorgeous eyes zeroed in on my trembling hand that gripped my purse like a lifeline, only tightening my hold when his strong, angular jaw squared in understanding.

Or disgust . . .

"Sorry about that," he finally said after a moment's pause, all business-like, "Lillith, right? Jason Thompson." He extended his right hand in a formal greeting. In return, I extended my left, meeting his eyes in a challenge while internally berating myself with how rude I was behaving.

"Nice to meet you, Mr. Thompson," I greeted formally in return, showing my respect when he switched hands without a moment's pause and shook with his left in greeting. "I hope I'm not early, I thought we had an appointment at five, so . . . here I am . . . " Not to mention that your receptionist even had me listed for five, too.

"No, you are correct." His eyes lightened with a sheepish air, the corners crinkling in embarrassment that only accented his boyish good looks. "We have a five o'clock appointment today, I just lost track of time. Thought I could get in a few more reps before you arrived." His eyes darted away from mine, glancing at the front desk. His embarrassed forgetfulness was kind of cute, in a way. It did explain why he was so sweaty, putting my mind at ease at the other possibilities my mind wandered to forbiddingly.

. . . I'm such a closet pervert.

It was oddly cute to see such a strong, tall, and handsome man look so pleasantly flustered. And with purple sparkles in his hair no less.

But while he looked away, my eyes unwittingly traveled down to his rock hard abs, and even further down to the V of his . . .

Oh God, have mercy. Those should be illegal . . .

A sudden fit of perverted coughing overtook my senses as I looked away from his godlike physique and back up to the safety of his eyes that were now, to my complete horror, regarding me with amused interest. My face burned with being caught ogling a complete stranger, and to my utter horror, I started spewing out the first thing that came to mind in a failed attempt to ease my burning embarrassment, "If my breasts were out like your irreligious abs, you'd have a hard time not staring, too."

Wait. What?

What Did I Just Say!?

He blinked. Then blinked again. Then he laughed. Hard. Almost doubling over from the effort that resulted in him loosening some of his purple sparkles in his hair. I watched them flutter to the ground in hopeless abandonment, finding I was too horrified and too petrified to even flee from this fiasco, to look him in the eyes. My trembling hand hardened, gripping my cheap purple bag like a lifeline.

"Yeah. You're right," he finally got out. Now standing at his full height. I continued to stare at the purple sparkles on the ground, refusing to glance up at his cruelly amused face. "Let me go grab a shirt since you're having such a hard time concentrating with my 'irreligious abs' distracting you. Is that even a word?" he added, still chuckling.

It most certainly was a word, if he knew who John Allen Paulos was, he'd know that was, in fact, a word. But he wouldn't because: 1) he owned his own gym and his job didn't require him to study such things, and 2) he had abs like steel so that automatically gave him a pass in my books.

"No, you're fine," I conceded, my face still burning with shame, "I'm just gonna go now and die in a back alley somewhere. Pretty sure being picked at by vultures would be less demeaning than me . . . still embarrassing myself because I don't know how to close my big fat mouth for the life of me without it slapping me in my face with . . . Okay, shutting up now and going."

I turned away from my total embarrassment, but before I could take a step, Jason spoke up, "I'll admit that my usual appointments don't start off so . . . extravagant." He chuckled, ignoring my tyrant of exasperating words on a level totally inappropriate that sums up my life at a very basic level. "But that's my fault. I lost track of time and I apologize for my totally unprofessional first impression. Amateur. Ignorant. Inefficient. Whatever you want to call it." He paused, then continued, "Why is - why do I have sparkles in my hair?"

I turned just in time to see the manager of this little establishment rubbing his hair with vigor as sprinkles rained from his hair. He looked down at his hands and grimaced when he saw them covered in the purple sprinkles as well as his broad, manly shoulders that I really needed to stop looking at right about then. "How in the . . . oh! Damn it! Marissa. Freakin' shelving . . . kid projects . . ." he finished while mumbling incoherent, incomplete sentences.

I smiled at his flustering, despite my overwhelming embarrassment. He scratched the back of his head sheepishly, looking at me with now carefree eyes. "I think it's safe to assume we're even, right? How 'bout we start over?" He took a step forward, ignoring the purple sparkles that fell in his line of vision and extended his left hand to me. "Jason Thompson," he began again as he shook my good hand, "it's nice to meet you, Lillith Miller. How can I help you? I understand you're looking for a personal trainer, correct?"

The first time I met Jason felt like ages ago. He was a conundrum all on his own. It didn't take long for me to fall for him. It wasn't love at first sight, but there was a spark, and it didn't have anything to do with his abs. That was just an added bonus.

Okay, I'll admit that the spark had ignited from those abs, but me falling for him was far more virtuous than a simple shallow obsession!

As the child played with her ABC blocks, it gave me time to think about that dream of a past memory I had last night about my first introduction to Jason. What an odd occurrence, I don't think I'd ever dreamt up a memory before . . .

And why did it have to be about Jason? And of all the memories I had to dream, it'd had to be the very one that I held dearly because it marked the first day of my changing for the better in more ways than one.

It was such a happy memory . . .

But now . . . it reminded me of everything that I forever lost.

Hisoka walked into the room with his usual flamboyant smile. He first made his way over to his kid and gave her a quick kiss on her head before bounding toward the TV to turn it on.

When I first came to true consciousness, Hisoka frightened me so much so that I couldn't get past his horns to appreciate how handsome he actually was. In fact, Hisoka was downright gorgeous. He definitely had a Ryan Reynolds roguish look going about him with a scruffy face and a strong jawline, but his maroon asian-angled eyes, that matched Veda's incidentally, were much bigger and expressive and not so close together. He was tall, probably reaching around six feet or more, but it was hard to tell his height when you're looking through the eyes of someone who barely reached a foot or two. He also had a very I-do-and-wear-what-I-want-and-I-don't-care-what-you-think aura about him.

And he had a knack of wearing loose sweatpants around the house, too, but thankfully he had the decency to wear a shirt. Despite Hisoka not being my own father, I still felt a little bit of indecency ogling the father of the kid I was stuck inside. Even though this wasn't my real body, Hisoka was still the father of this body and that is where I draw the line.

It was just wrong.

"Don't tell mommy that I'm letting you watch the news," he said before adding quietly right after, "or she'll kill me, flay me in that new green health-kick butter and serve me as some freakish salad garnish."

This was a regular thing that happened every weekday: Mom goes off to work since she's the breadmaker of the family, and Daddy stays home with the kid and is a full-time Dadny, (Dad and Nanny combined). An hour after Mother leaves, dear old (or young since he's only twenty-four - which makes me older than him, as odd as that sounds) Dad turns on the news and we watch all the breaking stories happening throughout the day.

Hisoka got a kick out of watching these, showing a sportsmanship for all the Heroes that rivaled those of seasoned, overzealous football players in my world. It was quite amusing when one of the Heroes on TV would get their butts kicked, how Hisoka would watch in open despair, then perk back up when the Hero makes a triumphant comeback, shouting and whooping like he himself was there cheering the Hero on.

He was such a man-child; it was sort of adorable.

"-trapped inside the rubble," a woman's voice cut in when Hisoka turned the TV on and to the correct channel. "Robert Dilango is on the scene now."

The screen changed from the newswoman sitting in the newsroom to a scene that was covered in smoke, and reminded me of that time my old neighbors house burned down right next door to mine in my old world, with a little man hovering in the middle of it. He tried his best to cover his eyes from the smoke as he spoke to the camera. "Robert Dilango here at the scene of a devastating Villain attack that happened just under half an hour ago in downtown Allenpark. Behind me you will see" -the camera zoomed away from the little man, that looked relatively normal, and to a burning office building in the back. The building looked roughly three stories high and was about the size of an averagely sized Walmart-"NSA Corporation up in flames. Eyewitnesses believe a man by the name of Bill Harper was seen entering the building after his untimely dismissal from the company and is suspected to be the root cause of the earlier explosion. How he did it is still a mystery but from what the records of state Quirk registration suggest, he is a prime suspect of the earlier explosion. We currently have two Heroes on the scene: Hero Incenory and Hero Electric Shock, both are searching for any survivors within the inflamed building as I speak. Hero Hydro is on the way."

Heroes. Another anomaly this world had that mine didn't. At least, not in the abundance -or same function - as this world worked. It all reminded me of those comic-book Marvel movies I grew up with; except, they weren't as powerful as the fictitious Heroes from my childhood. Definitely, no nickel-titanium alloy flying suits or half-baked man-childs running around with their heads cut off while haphazardly saving us from some destructive and overpowering alien invasion.

Of course, my world had Heroes too that came in the form of firefighters, policemen, and the like. This world had these type of people too, but, from what I could tell from all the news Hisoka watched, they weren't credited as often, if at all, as the professional Heroes were.

"Incenory and Electric Shock won't be of much use in this situation. They must have been the closest when this all went down, though," my father mumbled from the couch. "Hydro will be the key factor once he arrives. Wonder if that fu"-he glanced down at the kid and once he saw us staring back at him, ABC blocks momentarily forgotten, changed his wording at the last second-"Villain is still there."

He then smiled and stood up from the couch where he crouched and picked up the kid before returning to said couch to resume facing the television screen. He sat Veda and I on his lap and turned us so the kid was balancing on his knee and facing him. "You're never gonna become a Villain, got that fatty?"

That was uncalled for, and why would I ever become a bad guy - erm, the kid, I meant. As long as the home she grows up in stays the way it is, she'll become a relatively normal adult, with relatively normal ideals.

Also, for the record, Veda was a complete ball of baby fat, so calling her fatty without the aforementioned baby in front of the fat, was downright cruel and mean.

I won't forget that comment, dear old daddy.

"What am I even saying?" He chuckled. Reaching up, he lightly pinched the kid's cheek. "You're too cute to become a Villain. I mean, look at these fat cheeks! So fat, so chubby, so perfect!"

Please. Stop gushing your fatherly love in my general direction! It was too much! Seriously, I should have an off switch so I don't have to endure all this.

His eyes swiveled back to the TV momentarily before giving me his full attention again. "Glad you're not crying anymore every time I hold you. That made daddy really, really sad."

My bad. Still felt bad for that, even if that was more than eight months ago since the kid cried over my irrational fears; the wound was still fresh on my conscious.

And him mentioning it over and over again didn't help any.

"Do you know what will make daddy really, really happy?"

The kid farted.

"If you say daddy or dada. Say Dada, Veda. Da-da. That's an easy one, right?" He repeated Dada a couple of times, but the only response he got was the kid's impenetrable blank stare.

Probably drooling too, but since I couldn't feel anything the kid felt, I could only imagine.

Did kids start speaking at fifteen months?

Plus, wouldn't the appropriate first words for a child be mama? Since she carried the kid for nine months, you'd think she'd at least get the privilege of the kid's first words being 'mama'. But, that probably won't be the case in this situation considering the father taking on the nurturing role while the mother made the dough.

"Come on, Veda! You're gonna make daddy cry again."

Little droplets of tears accumulated in his corner tear ducts, stacking truth on his innocent threat. He was such a princess. Admittedly, though, it was kind of adorable.

Again, the kid strangely stared blankly into his matching maroon eyes, not once attempting to repeat what he was saying. Hisoka's head dropped in mock defeat. Little sniffles heard over his failure. "You're so cruel, Veda. So cruel to daddy."

Give her time, Hisoka. She'd speak eventually.

At least, I had hoped.

"Hydra has made it to the scene!" The voice of the reporter on the scene boomed over Hisoka's moping, effectively bringing him out of his brooding and back to the action broadcasting on the news.

"He's redirecting all of the underground water systems and directing it toward the flames!"

The cameraman zoomed in on a Hero wearing a funky blue costume with fins flapping his arms about in a messed up version of the rain dance as water flew from the grounds and misted over the flames, bringing them down to size and density. Smoke still perforated the area, covering our view of the building from where the reporters stood, but slowly, eventually, the smoke dissipated, revealing bodies in work suit attire shuffling out from the inflamed buildings, escorted by another man in a black suit with lightning bolt designs littering the length of his Hero costume.

Hisoka situated his kid and I on his lap so we had a perfect view of the screen and what was happening just outside our homebody walls. The child innocently perpetuating stare watched the chaos come to a close, unblinking, unwavering, taking in the information but not understanding what it was conveying. Not like how I could see it.

Then, another explosion erupted on the other side of the building, and from that explosion came a body, flying from the debris and smoke and landing in a heap far away from the escaping civilians.

"Holy-" Hisoka started, but stopped himself before he could let a swear fly; like he usually did. He was good about not swearing in front of his kid; he was the ideal father most parents inspire to be, even if he didn't see it from his own perspective.

"Here we go sweety!" my father's voice rose with excitement as the action commenced. "Watch a real hero in action!"

A real hero?

Another person walked through the billowing wall of smoke. When the camera zoomed in on him we got a good look at his hero costume, a suit of red with buckles and small flame designs. He walked out from the hole he created on the side of the building and took off in a sprint toward the body that was now recovering from, what I would assume, being blown away by Incenory's Quirk that resulted in that harsh landing. The Hero didn't give him any reprieve before he was on him, taking him down with a knee to the face, and then a foot to the gut. When the presumed Villain fell on his back, the Hero took something out of his back large pocket that took up the expanse of his back, chains, and tied the Villain up, the fight only lasted maybe ten seconds, and in those ten seconds, Hisoka had his kids hands in his larger ones and acted out the fight while using his kid like a doll, making this kid's fists fly forward all the while making punching noises.

He was such a dork.

"Oh, wow, now that's what we call a professional Hero. No hesitation whatsoever. Wish we could have seen the fight inside. Incenory was always a hands-on, no questions asked, kind of Hero. Pretty awesome, right Veda?"

A prolonged dirty and nasty-wet fart ripped from the kid, followed closely by a long and sufferable pregnant pause.

Then Hisoka gagged, growing paler by the second when his eyes bugged out. "Oh God. Veda, sweety"-another gage-"please don't do this to daddy. Please wait till"-another gage, that one sounding wet-"hold it in until mommy gets home. Please, daddy's begging ya."

The kid completely decimated her diaper, putting to shame all other blown diapers in one fell swoop.

This was one of the rare cases where I was more than glad that I couldn't feel what was happening to this body inside my tunnel. All I could do was watch.

And watch I did.

Hisoka face contorted, turning red as he looked away and covered his mouth in hopes of not emptying his stomach all over the living room floor. His body lurched with each dry heave before he finally was able to take in large gulps of air through his wide open mouth.

"Okay, okay," he conceited, turning his watery eyes back to the two of us, "just stop-"

Another earth-shattering, deplorably heinous, fart-filled crap reverberated through the kids' butt, effectively turning Hisoka's face a pale green. He quickly stood up with the kid extended far away from him as he made his way to the bathroom. Once inside, he sat the kid in the sink before he ran to the toilet and dry heaved into it.

Yes, totally safe. No baby would crawl from the sink and NOT fall.

Apparently, Veda was that baby.

After a moment of almost hurling his lunch, Hisoka came back to the kid who sat quietly in the sink and stared at her with defeated, yet mildly disgusted, eyes. He sighed deeply, his face relaxing with the effort.

"Okay"-he reached forward-"Let's get this over with."

Another fart vibrated within the sink, along with the sounds of something squishing, and Hisoka found himself hunched over the toilet once again.

"No more peaches"-coughing, dry heave-"for you!"

Believe me, daddy, that wasn't caused by peaches. When Rose comes back home from work, you should ask her about those peas. I heard the kids tummy rumbling after she ate those green suckers.

After some more wet dry heaves and a now clean tushie, Hisoka was back on the couch, his head leaning back and was breathing heavy from the exertion of trying not to hurl the whole time he cleaned Veda's behind, with his arm draped over his sweaty forehead.

The kid and I sat on the ground, occasionally glancing up at our unusually quiet daddy as we continued our game of ABC blocks; trying to stack two on top of one another before they fell over. Our chubby fingers clasped over the blocks that were too large for just one hand, and very slowly, very shakingly, stacked them up on another block, but it fell over right when she let go, the block falling to the ground in a heap of defiance.

The kid's movement was slow, clumsy, and no thought behind it whatsoever.

I didn't think anything of it at the time.

"Never again," Hisoka mumbled disjointedly. "No more poop. No more. Gonna have nightmares for days. Poop . . . too much . . . gonna hurl thinking about it."

A phone vibrated off toward the kitchen, startling Hisoka from his self loathing. Hisoka slowly, very carefully, got up from his seat while running his hand down his distraught and sunken face in exasperation, and then sauntered slowly toward the kitchen.

"Hello?" Came Hisoka's nettled voice from the kitchen. The strain he put into trying not to gage could be heard clearly from where I sat.

"Hey, honey . . . no, no, I'm good, everything's a-okay . . . huh? . . . why not? . . . when will you be home? . . . okay, I'll have dinner ready when you get home. . . . Love you too . . . "

After a moment Hisoka came back into the living room looking a tad less green. He walked over toward me and sat down in front of us.

"Mommy's gonna be home later than usual tonight so no more explosions, okay?" He picked us up and held us over his head and continued with a soft, loving smile, "How does chicken caesar salad sound, Veda? Think mama would appreciate it?"

The child's answer was to hurl chunks of peaches into his face, effectively making him run into the bathroom and start the process of dry-heaving all over again.

Ah, the joys of having a baby . . .

Like how Hisoka had said, Rose didn't make it home till later. But when she walked through the front door in her office suit and high bun and into the living room to see Hisoka and the kid clapping to Yo Gabba Gabba, she was beaming with joy.

She laid her purse and jacket on the sofa and made her way to her husband first to give her usual kisses and greetings before making her way to us to give the ritual of kisses and hugs she does almost every evening when she arrives home from work.

"How was she today?" Rose asked like she always did. She held us in her arms when she turned back toward Hisoka, and the kid held onto her with a vice-like grip, no longer giving me a view other than her shoulder and a piece of chocolate I just then spotted on the couch.

I suddenly had a deep craving to taste that chocolate, and the kid reacted by squirming in her mother's grip.

"She - ah, had an accident in her - ah - diaper earlier," Hisoka admitted lamely, probably scratching the back of his head, right underneath his brown horns-that oddly enough, Veda's small horns that rounded around her small forehead, starting right before her temples and ending just past them by about an inch, were more of an ash gray-like he usually did when he sounded so sheepishly.

Not going to mention the puking incident, huh?

"And you cleaned her up!" Rose exclaimed with glee, even when I could hear the undertone of laughter in her voice. She walked over to him and we found ourselves squashed between the two parents as Rose rained small kisses over his lips and cheeks. "Did you puke again?" Her grip resituated us back on her hip when our squirming upped in determination to get to that piece of chocolate!

"Nope!" Hisoka popped the P with pride. "I held it in this time. Only gagged a little."

A lot, he meant.

"I'm so proud of you, Hisoka."

I was too, actually. He did puke the last couple of times he had to change the kid's diaper. It was a definite improvement.

"So does that mean you can change her diaper more often?"

"Not happening."

Rose only laughed in return and the Kid and I was once again smushed between the two married couple. I tried my best to ignore the kissing sounds above.

"So," Rose began once the two separated, "are you going to ask me why I came home late?"

Hisoka paused for only a moment but caught on to what Rose was asking. "Oh, yes, I was just about to ask," he lied easily. "Why did you come home late, honey? You said you had to go somewhere?"

"I did. I was at my doctor's."

"Your doctor's?" His tone was no longer light with playfulness but held a note of concern for his wife, his maroon eyes searching her hazels. Out of the corner of the kid's eye, I could see him lay a hand on Rose's opposite shoulder. "Is everything okay?"

"Yes, yes, of course. I'm fine. Everything is fine," Rose chirpily clarified, sounding as nonchalant as humanly possible. "Just pregnant again. That's all."

A pregnant pause clouded the room.

No pun intended.

This little declaration even had me utterly surprised.

Slowly, I willed the kid to look at the two parents standing stock still, my cravings momentarily subdued from the suddenly thickened tension in the air.

"Really?" Hisoka finally broke the silence, his voice oddly quiet.

"Yes. Really."

Rose and their kid were swept up into yet another hug, squishing us between the two bodies again. Hisoka leaned in and rained kisses over every inch of Rose's face as she giggled from the overwhelming affection. Then, he moved to his kid, and gave small kisses across her face, too.

I had to remind myself repeatedly that this was a happy moment, no need to make the baby cry from my mortification.

"This is great!" Hisoka exclaimed, his face beaming with a wide grin. "You're great!" he had to clarify for whatever reason. "You're perfect. Everything is perfect." He turned his beaming eyes on us. "You're gonna be a big sister, Veda." He ran his hand over the kid's head, and all he got in return, again, was a blinking, blank stare.

I should have noticed there something wasn't right, but I was too caught up in the moment to observe it.

Well, this was going to be interesting. I didn't know what to expect, like, at all.

In my world, being an orphan, you didn't have baby brothers or sister when you were put up for adoption alone, obviously. And when a kid or even a toddler or baby came into the picture, it wasn't long before they were adopted out before that bond could be created.

But I did wonder if my imagination would live up to real-world expectations. Growing up in my younger years, I did allow myself the pardon of dreaming unrealistic dreams without preamble, and one of those dreams consisted of me being a big or little sister. Would I be the protective big sister, or would I be the little sister and be protected by my older sibling?

Veda was going to be a big sister, and I was going to watch her grow into that role. It was like my own personal real-life sitcom, and, to tell the truth, I was looking forward to watching Veda grow up in this beautiful family. Veda had everything I ever wanted, and now she was allowing me to live that life through her eyes. I was grateful, in a way. It made me think my existence wasn't as bad as I had originally thought.

I was correct to think just that because, in actuality, my existence here was much worse than I could have had ever imagined.

Not so long after, as the weeks passed and the days repeated with Rose going off to work and Hisoka staying home for his kids' sake, Rose's stomach steadily grew.

And as her stomach grew with their unborn child, so did my concerns for Veda.

She should be talking now; showing characteristic emotions associated with being a toddler. But she was silent.

All was silent.

Didn't she have emotions I felt when I came to true conscious and she was still a newborn? I know I felt her emotions. They'd sometimes overtook my own. I remember feeling them.

But now all was silent.

It had to be my fault. There was no other correlation.

I was a parasite, after all.

A horrible parasite.

But I couldn't let my grief overcame me because when I allowed it, Veda would cry.

I needed to be strong for both our sakes and for the sake of Rose and Hisoka.

But, I wasn't alone in noticing Veda's vacant emotions and responses.

It was another day at the doctor's, and like the last visit, Rose spoke her concerns.

"She hasn't said a word or even attempted to talk. I just - I don't - I don't know what's going on."

The pediatrician took the kids vitals, checking her heart, her reflexes, and then her temperature. Veda obliged, allowing him to do everything without complaint; without feeling.

I willed myself to watch without feeling. At least, I tried. I was afraid my feelings would complicate this seemingly important appointment.

"She also lacks . . . emotions," Rose continued, her hesitance palpable. "The complicated ones, I mean."

The doctor sat down, picking up his clipboard to write everything down. "What do you mean by complicated emotions, Rose."

"She cries, of course, when something scares her. And she does feel pain and cries when she does too, but with everything else - she's so vacant. She plays with her toys like it's more of a chore than it being fun for her. It's like after she learned to sit up on her own, she'd stopped learning. When Hisoka or I give her attention, she just stares forward almost like she's just staring right through us; through me."

Tears sprang to her eyes then, but she dabbed them away from a tissue she grabbed in the waiting room.

"I don't know what to do," Rose continued shakingly, "I don't want to wait till it's too late if something is truly wrong with her."

"She's only 20 months old," the doctor interjected, drawling on, "hardly enough time for you to be concerned. There are some kids that learn at a slower pace than others. Veda is probably one of these kids."

"Are you saying Veda is slow?"

"No, of course not. She's still a toddler. Every child develops at their own rate. And with the added in Quirk phenomenon, that spectrum of learning significantly changes so much so that we, ourselves, are still learning, even to this day, the developmental phases of an infant child who has a quirk. It's like trying to compare oranges to apples, Mrs. Nasake. We do not have enough studies to confirm if the child is developing in a sense normal to her age group this early on. She may have a Quirk that's hindering her senses in a way we simply cannot predict until she's old enough to tell us differently."

Rose paused, processing the information slowly. "So," she started slowly, the creepy telltale of hysteria in the forefront of her voice that only I knew from the months of observing she was trying to control, "what you are saying is that she may have a Quirk that is causing her to act the way she is now. Am I missing something or isn't her horns her Quirk?"

Good question.

The doctor lifted his clipboard, reading through the information with a critical, trained eye. "Yes, she gets that from her father. My records show that Veda father side shows an adeptness to developing two Quirks: one being the horns, and the other usually being the other parents' Quirk, either a physical Quirk or otherwise. A rare phenomenon but not unheard of when it comes to mutant type Quirks like your husband's lineage."

Mutant . . . ?

Rose was silent again, her face giving way no emotion.

I wish they knew about me, then they'd know it was my fault Veda was the way she was, not because of a second Quirk or whatever.

All my fault.

I could scream, and Veda would scream, too. Would that make them notice me? Would putting Veda through my tormented matured emotions without regard to her mental health be the best choice of action in this situation?

I didn't know, and I couldn't make that decision on my own. I just couldn't.

Why do I even exist?

"Can't you test to see how many Quirks she has? I thought we had the capabilities to do that in today's medicine?" When Rose spoke evenly and calmly, showing no hint of emotion, I knew it was only a matter of time for the kettle to start whistling.

"Yes - and no. Veda is only twenty months old, for her Quirk to actually show up in results at such a young age is slim to none. Quirks genomes don't show in the system until they've started to mature, especially when it comes to emitter type Quirks"-Rose repeated the word 'emitter' with bitterness lacing her tone-"I wouldn't worry too much right now, Rose, and that's my professional opinion."

Rose stayed silent, her eyes obscured from her blonde bangs, but after a moment she slowly stood up and walked over to Veda. When she picked us up, I still couldn't see her face.

"Thank you for your time, doctor." Her voice was robotic; forced. "We'll be leaving now."

The doctor didn't pay any mind to her sudden passive-aggressive tone, or simply didn't notice.

"Take care, Rose. And don't worry so much, your daughter will be fine. I've seen similar cases such as your daughters and all of them turned out to be healthy children."

"Thank you," was Rose's only reply before she walked out of the office.

Driving home I watched Rose as she drove blankly while absentmindedly rubbing her growing stomach. When Veda looked away and at the flashing trees outside the window, I let my mind wander, trying to reel in my emotions as effectively as I could stop stealing Veda's.

I was a parasite feeding off Veda's emotions. There was no other explanation.

I actually thought it wasn't too late.

I was horribly wrong.

"I don't know what to do, Hisoka. She won't talk, and when she looks to me it's like she's looking straight through me. Like she's blind, but actually isn't!"

Rose fussed after a week of silence. After the doctor's appointment, she became uncharacteristically quiet, especially around Hisoka, but she still continued to be a loving mother, not letting her grievance get in the way of her motherhood.

She'd even told Veda and me that no matter what, she would always love us.

That hurt me more than it should.

"I don't know what to say," Hisoka quietly conceded, scratching the back of his head as he held Veda and me in his lap on top of the living room couch. Rose paced back and forth in front of us, her arms crossed and her brows knitted in irritation.

"We can't really do anything about it," Hisoka reasoned, returning his hand back to hold Veda in place, even though it wasn't needed. Veda watched the little spectacle with her usual wide, open eyes. Soaking everything in but feeling nothing in return.

All the while I stayed inside my subconscious tunnel and watched through the eyes of this child with my own emotions churning in distress.

Just reign it in. I needed to stay calm and let Veda filter her own emotions. Maybe her brain wired itself to believe I was the main host of emotions and forethinking . . .

I didn't know!

Why do I exist!?

"She's only twenty months old like the pediatrician said-"

"He isn't right!" Rose interrupted, her voice booming over Hisoka's. Her wild eyes now trained on Hisoka's, pleading with him to understand within the depths of her churning irritation. "He isn't the mother of Veda, I am! He's only basing his observation off of some false pretenses he doesn't even fully understand." She started to pace again. "He'd even admitted that he couldn't fully understand the nature of Quirks at such a young age, right to my face, and then had the gall to tell me to my face, again, that I shouldn't worry. Well, guess what? I'm freaking out!"

"Yeah, I can see that . . . " Hisoka mumbled under his breath.

"What if-" she stopped pacing and paused in her tyrant. She wasn't facing us directly, but when she covered her mouth with both her hands, her clear distress was evident, even from my vantage point below. "What if she won't be able to lead a normal life - be normal, Hisoka?" Her voice quivered. I couldn't feel it, but I knew Hisoka's grip tightened around Veda by the way he suddenly grew deathly quiet. "What if she stays like this? This . . . this shell of what could have been if she didn't have me as a mother!"

"Rose!" Hisoka's voice now boomed. Veda's vision shifted up and then down when she was sat back onto the couch, no longer in Hisoka's lap. "Enough already!" Hisoka continued as he stood in front of Rose, his arms enclosed around her quivering shoulders.

"I'm not going to stand here and listen to you putting yourself down!" He tightened his arms around her, then nuzzled his nose into the side of her long blonde hair. "Even if you're right and Veda has that Quirk I know you're scared she may have, we'll work through it; find a way to get through to her. But we can't give up. She'll be okay. I know it. Just trust her. Trust in us, Rose. We can do this."

Rose buried her head into his shoulder, wrapping her arms around Hisoka in return. "I'm just so scared, Hisoka. I don't want my child to live the same life as my grandma. I don't want that for her."

As they cried and comforted one another, Veda continued to stare at them, unblinking, unknowingly crushing my very soul.

Everything was my fault.

I wanted to fix this.

I wanted to disappear.

Forever . . .

If I disappeared, everything will be okay. Everything will be fixed.

As the days continued to pass, the more unresponsive Veda grew. I tried my best to reign in everything that was me, trying to allow Veda be who she was meant to be, but it was a losing battle.

It came to the point that the doctors had to step in. They ran tests, simulations, everything you could possibly think of, but the results all came back the same: Veda was a normal, healthy child. Even MRIs came back normal, surprisingly, showing a healthy developing, adolescent brain.

It all didn't make sense.

It was all impossible.

So, I continued to recede back as far as I possibly could inside Veda's subconscious, until one day everything went to hell.

The morning started out like any other morning: Rose came into our room singing my little sunshine like she'd done every morning. I'd be fully awake and she'd walk over to my crib, and when she'd reach for us, Veda would just look at her and a pained look would cross Rose face before she'd reach into the crib and grab Veda. She'd then tell me that she would always love me and she would never give up on me, and then we'd go into the kitchen where Veda and I are usually served sliced bananas and apples.

And with each passing day, Veda being able to simply grab the food and shove it into her mouth became less of a thing.

This morning was no exception. Veda only looked at her food, not even attempting to eat it even when her tummy grumbled in protest.

Rose noticed instantly.

"What's wrong, baby girl?" Rose asked softly as she approached us. She tapped the baby chair tabletop with her finger. "Are you not hungry?" Her question was instantly answered when she heard Veda's tummy rumble in return.

"Come on, Veda. Eat for mommy?" Rose grabbed a piece of apple and placed it inside one of Veda's chubby little toddler fingers. Veda looked down at the piece of fruit, then back up at Rose, unmoving, unblinking.

"Do you not like apple, Veda?" Rose voice quivered when she asked the question, smiling through as she closed her eyes to stem the tears prickling the corner of her eyes.

She was trying so hard to be strong.

She replaced the apple with a banana slice and slowly coaxed Veda's hand to her mouth, pushing the forearm with her hand.

When she let her arm go, Veda's hand dropped. Veda didn't even look at the banana slice but only continued to stare at the mother.

Tears began to run down Rose's cheeks, no longer able to bear them as I watched her world crumble, again, watching her motionless daughter unable to do the most basic of things.

"Oh Veda, it's okay . . . it's okay," her voice broke, quivering along with the tears flowing down her cheeks.

Rose sniffled, and then let out a small whine. She covered her eyes with her right hand and let out a slow, quivering breath. Tilting her head back she breathed in, trying to collect herself for Veda's sake.

But she failed.

And all I could do was watch.

I couldn't do anything else BUT watch!

Another soft whine fell from her lips, and when she breathed in, she let out a louder cry. With each breath, she grew louder and louder till she was full out balling, her broken cries echoing in the small kitchen that had my non-physical heart breaking.

Everything was my fault.

I shouldn't be there.

Completely useless.

What was the point of me existing like this?

Crawling further and further into myself I didn't notice that the images before me growing farther away, my conscious falling back into my tunnel until my world began to blink out. All I could see was a light at the end of my tunnel, and as it blinked at me, flickering as it tried to stay alight, I willed it to die, and my world finally grown dark, gifting me with my wish to finally disappear.

It all happened in an instant. One moment my world was utter darkness, unable to see, hear, or feel a thing, and the next . . .

"Veda! Veda! Oh god please wake up baby!"

What happened? Why wasn't Veda waking up? Where were we?

What was going on!?

"Is she up yet?" Hisoka's voice shouted somewhere in front of us, his voice clearly panicked.

"N-no! She won't - she stopped - oh God! Hurry up Hisoka!"

Honking was soon followed as well as Hisoka's swearing.

But Veda's eyes still did not open, didn't even blink.

"Oh God please, please let her be okay. Let her be okay!" Rose chanted, over and over again.

Still, Veda didn't budge.

I waited, listening to the frantic cries of Rose as she tried to elicit any response from Veda, and to Hisoka as he drove and cursed in his panic.

I waited . . .

And waited . . .

And waited . . .

"Please . . . Please don't take her from me . . ."

And with that final prayer, I plunged forward, all restraint and forethought forgotten. Searching, trying to feel for Rose's warmth I'd felt when Veda was still a baby and was able to feel her own emotions, but when I didn't feel anything, not even a gentle caress of a fluttering warmth, I lunged forward, even more, plunging my subconscious as far as my will would allow without caution or constraint. Farther than I ever had gone before, my panic overriding my reasoning before, once again, everything grew dark.

But I could still hear.

Panic gasps . . .

Crying . . .

More cursing . . .

A gentle, yet foreign caress of fingers across my forehead . . .

"Oh, shit!"

Author's Note: Wanted to thank Deluxemclovin, 9thDimen, and sk2dydid for reviewing in the last chapter!

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