Author's note: My apologies for the sporadic nature of my updates. My muse went on strike, then was murdered somewhere. So I had to see about hiring a new one. Hopefully, my new muse will be a little more timely in inspiring my writing. (BTW, that was figuratively speaking. No one was actually killed to prevent my writing. Don't take it literally.)
When my mind started making it's journey toward wakefulness, I got the feeling that something was wrong. No, not wrong, just . . . different. I was content to doze, considering this feeling, until I felt the movement of air across my face.
Instantly, my mind was slammed awake. As I struggled to comprehend the fact that there was a woman in my bed, I started to pull my arm away from where it lay draped across her waist. A whimper from Eri stopped that motion cold, and I realized I had no interest in waking her up.
My eyes glazed over and I stared off into space and, as I remembered the events of the night before, I could feel the anger building inside of me. I remembered the robot and how it was squeezing the life out of the dark-haired girl lying next to me. The only other thing I remembered was Haruko-that evil smirk on her face, and how she taunted me.
Focusing on Eri's face calmed me down immediately and replaced the anger with a strange tenderness. Distantly, I remembered a saying I had once heard: "The purity of a person's soul can be seen in their face when they are sleeping." From where I was lying, I figured that Eri had the purest soul on earth.
I laid there looking at her for what seemed an eternity before I decided that I had get up. In a series of movements that would have amazed a contortionist, I managed to crawl over Eri's sleeping body and off of the bed without waking her up. I grabbed a set of clean clothes out of my dresser, then headed out of my room and for the bathroom. I had just gotten my pants on when I realized that all of Eri's clothes were probably scattered all over our small yard. Because I was suddenly in a rush to get some clothes for her before she woke up, I didn't bother putting my shirt on; I ran out of the bathroom, down the stairs, and out the back door.
Miraculously, Eri's dresser drawers seemed to have survived the destruction of her bedroom and the rest of her dresser; they were lying neatly on the ground near a small pile of shattered floorboards. I grabbed a pair of jeans, a shirt, and a set of undergarments out, then hurried back into the house. When I got back into my room, I found Eri still sleeping in my bed. I piled her clothes onto a chair, then headed back to the bathroom to shave and finish getting dressed.
After lathering up, I looked at my reflection in the mirror and laughed. Here I am, sixteen years old with a grand total of about eight whiskers on my face and I'm treating shaving like it's an all important thing to do. After quickly shaving, going to the bathroom, and putting my shirt on, I headed back into my room.
Somehow, I completely forgot that Eri was in there. My memory was quickly refreshed when, upon opening the door, I saw her. She had her pants on, but was clutching her shirt to her chest as she looked at her body in my mirror. A body that, I knew, should have been a rather pale skin tone but was instead black. And blue. My mouth gaped open. It wasn't due to the fact that there was a half-naked girl standing in front of me, but because I couldn't believe what had happened to her. Because of Haruko.
The anger I had felt earlier that morning resurfaced a million times stronger. I backed out through the bedroom door and slammed it behind me. Not aware of where I was going, I quickly walked through our house.
"You have to learn to control it,"
The gentle voice caught me completely by surprise, and I found myself standing on the sidewalk in front of the entrance to our bakery. Next to and slightly behind me stood the balding form of Grandpa's hired help, Jordan Randal. "What do you know?" I asked heatedly.
When the older man put his hand on my shoulder, I could feel my anger bleeding away. "I know a great deal about it," he told me quietly. "But you wont do anyone any good unless you learn control."
I'll show him control, the thought raced unbidden through my mind. I shook his hand off of me, and leapt into the air. And came crashing back down. "Why didn't I fly?" I wondered out loud.
I saw a pair of boots step up beside my face. "Control is important; nearly the most important. The only thing more important than control is knowledge. Self knowledge." I started getting angry again, but his touch drained the emotion from me again.
"I know how your newfound power works. More importantly, I know why it works. But in order to control it, you need to learn that why."
"And the next thing I know, you'll be telling me why she is after me," I sneered at him, fully believing that he would have no idea who I was referring to.
Randal roughly pulled me to my feet. "You're damn right I know why," he snapped, obviously frustrated by my attitude. He paused and took a moment to calm himself. "You obviously don't care enough to listen to me, though," he said, releasing his hold on me. "But when the time comes that you realize how much she has hurt you, you can come find me. I will be at work."
With a whisper of clothing, he was gone. And I was confused. Deep in thought, I wandered into the back yard, and started cleaning up the debris. A sharp piece of wood cut my finger, and I angrily kicked it across the yard.
"Why are you so angry, Naota?" I had heard Eri come into the yard a few minutes earlier, and knew that she was standing there watching me. That took my mind off of what Jordan Randal had said, and now had me more confused in a different way. I hated watching other people do things; why did she insist on watching me?
I sighed and let my shoulders sag. "I feel like someone has rigged the play again," I told her. "I'm being pushed into a role that I don't want to play. I've been turned into the enemy of a woman who used to be one of the most important people in the world to me. I don't know how: I didn't do anything."
She stepped closer to me. "I'll tell you what. If you keep cleaning up out here, I'll sit and listen to you scream at how unfair it is. I'll even help. It will be like we're little kids again." When she reached out to take the load of clothes out of my arms, her hands touched mine. The hair on my neck stood straight up, and I shivered at the electric current that suddenly ran through my body. After taking her clothes from me, Eri gave me a weird look then started walking away.
"Oh," she said, turning halfway around to see me. "Since I'm out a room and a dresser, I'm gonna put all of my clothes in the empty dresser in your room. Okay?" Without waiting for an answer, she turned back around and continued walking.
I stood there for a few minutes, confused, before getting back to cleaning up the yard. I had just finished throwing the last pieces of shattered wood into a pile when I realized that Jordan Randal actually must know something about my situation. Eri came to find me to ask if I still wanted to scream, but I lied and told her that I felt better. I hurried away from her and into the bakery, looking for Jordan. I found him and Grandpa standing around, doing nothing, so I asked if he would talk to me. He took me back into the storeroom, and sat me down.
"Will you listen now?" he asked calmly.
I nodded. "You're not who you say you are," I stated.
"Oh?" He actually looked amused.
While I was thinking, I had come to an inescapable conclusion. "You're Atomsk."
When I thought about what he had said earlier, it made perfect sense. Other than Haruko, Atomsk's love, who would know how to harness the power that Atomsk himself had? See? It really was simple.
"I was almost afraid you wouldn't figure it out," he told me with a smirk. "That's why I had to make it so obvious."
I stood up in an angry rush. "Then why don't you do something about all this?" I waved my arms around.
His eyes took on the look of someone who had been deeply hurt. "Because," he told me in a whisper, "I can't."
My jaw dropped. "The man with enough N.O. to steal whole star systems can't do anything?"
Randal dropped down to sit cross-legged on the floor, and waved at me to sit back down. "The answer to that question is simple. It's part of why you can do the things you do."
We sat in silence for a few moments before I got uncomfortable. "And why can I do what I do?" I asked quietly, almost dreading the answer.
"The reason you have my powers," Jordan Randal answered me slowly, "is because of love."