Warnings and Headsup!

THIS CHAPTER HAS SUBJECT OF ABUSE!

1) this story does contain mention of abuse, and full out present day abuse. It got a little detailed in one of the chapters and though nothing is stated specifically, for those of you who are smart enough to know what 2+2 is... you'll be able to understand where the train of thought was going. I will mark which chapters are the bad ones... If you skip... you wont really miss anything important, just an awesome rescue attempt!

2) this gets depressing and a little dark... but it comes out cheerful and rainbow and butterflies in the end, I promise!

3) THIS IS NOT A LOVE STORY! Duke does NOT fall in love with the OC and the OC does NOT fall in love with him! Sorry if I've made it sound like it was going in a different direction.

4) its not that good at the end... but like my last story... it gets better as it goes on I promise!

5) It may seem that my OC has a few things to realize before this is all said and done... and there are... I've tried to keep it organized... but if you have trouble basically she needs to gain self-confidence, trust, and a belief that there are heroes out there who wont fail her... kinda ties in with the whole trust thing...

6) THE END NOW READ!

Ch. 3: Scars to Share

I whipped my eyes, trying to gain control as he stared at me intently.

"Polly, let me see your eye."

That stopped me crying for a second. I looked at him.

"W-what?" I hicuped.

"Please?"

I just sat there, starring at him. He siged a little and then reached up and fliped his eye patch up. I gasped. His eye... was like mine... sort of. His two lids were closed together, sealing his eye shut was a small, diagnal scar that ran from the top right corner of his eye to the bottom left.

"Now, its your turn." he said softly.

I started crying again, but put my hand under my bangs and lifted them up. He looked at my now exposed face and looked shocked and sad. My two lids were closed too, but I didn't have a scar, unless you counted the scar tissue that held my eye shut. No tears fell from it. Of course they wouldn't, that eye was completely and uterly dead. No vision, no tear ducts, no nothing. You could open it with your hand if you really wanted to, but all you would see is white, as if a thick fog had taken over it; not even the color of the iris visible.

I cried even harder as he took my hands, both of them, in his; letting my bangs fall down. "How?" he asked. But I shook my head.

"I lost mine with a blade." he was volenteering his information, and I knew why. He didn't really expect me to respond. He just wanted to show me that I wasn't alone. "Polly, I know what's wrong. Do you?"

I shook my head. I had never known why I felt the way I did. So misserable, issolated, no matter where I went or who I was with. It just never made sense to me. I figured it was a lot of things, but what did I know.

"You're afraid, angry, and probably hate a person or two so much, you can't do anything but think of them, even though you wish they'd just disapear so you wouldn't have to worry about them." How did he know?

"I know exactly what you're feeling right now. Issolation, confusion, you probably are wondering if it's even worth trying to get back. You can't think of anyone who would be happy to see you, after all, you were always the out cast. No matter how much you tried, no one let you be you, they saw you, and judged you right off."

"H-how do y-y-you kn-know?" I said whipping my eyes again.

"I know, because I feel the same way." he said.

"I've never been apart of anything." I said, my voice, meracualisly had steadied. Then I shook my head. "Why should I believe you? How do I know you're telling the truth?"

"Look at my scars." He said. "They tell a story you know. And the one's that you can't see, are the one's that stay with you forever."

I knew what he meant. The scars that you could only feel, they never go away, even if phisical ones sometimes do.

I nodded, encouraging him to continue.

"I was put into a bad possition as a kid. My mom died when I was three, and my dad... he was a drunk. We lived in a bad part of town, it was rough. I was beat up everywhere I went, school, park... home." he stopped. I could tell he was thinking of painful memeries. "I have so many places where I was hurt, and by so many people. Including my father." he spat out the last word as if it was a bad word. "He was actually the worst of them all. I wont tell you all that he did, but I'm sure you know how someone in a druken rage can get."

I nodded. I knew a little of how a druken person could act. My own father had gotten a little bad when he got drunk, nothing like Duke's father, but... he would yell and rant so bad I some times wonder if it would've been easier on everyone if he just hit people around when he got waisted like every other dead beat.

"When I was 13 I was picked up by the Brotherhood of the Blade, a well organized gang in my town. They had seen my special tallents from the time I was 10 when I committed my first shop lift. A hockey puck I really wanted but couldn't afford. They had kept an eye on me for three years, watching me improve my 'skills' as I grew. They finally approached me and asked if I wanted to join. I did. When I got home and my father saw my saber on my sholder, he grabbed it. He was already drunk, and he was pissed that I had joined up with them. He took it, and gave me this nice little reminder of how disgusted he was and how worthless he thought I was. So, I ran away that night. I went to the emergancy room, got my eye tended to, then stayed at the gang's secret headquarters. I thought, since I was in a gang, I would finally be excepted amongst people. That I would be needed. I was a loner just like you, everywhere. I was afraid people would notice my scars from my father's tantrums. After I joined the Brotherhood however, people started avoiding me. I was suspected for every little thieft that occured. I didn't really mind. By now I was 16, I had been with the gang for three years, and where I never did fit in as well as others seemed to, I still felt like I belonged there more then I belonged anywhere else. It wasn't until I was well in my late teens, only a few months from being twenty, that it finally hit me, I didn't even belong with them. We were in the middle of a jewl highst and someone tripped the alarm. I was ambused by one of the gang members, Falcone, who took what I had successfully stolen, and left me to be arrested." his face twisted. "Falcone was the one person who got close to me and who I thought really carred for me. I tought him all I knew, even though he had been in the gang longer then I had, I was more skilled then he was. That was the case with most of them. I just seemed to have a natural tallent for burglery. But when it hit me that I didn't even belong with the people I thought were my friends, I decided to go solo. I excaped jail and went out on my own. I pulled off about another two, three dozen theifts before Dragonis took over my world and I was recruted by the team to help take him down. I have trouble with trust the same way you do. I don't want to end up the same way I did when I trusted Falcone, but I've fought along side these guys for almost an entire year, and not once have they ever let me down."

As he finished his story, I felt myself shaking from the sobs. I was still crying. But whether it was for me or for him now, I didn't know. But what I did know was that I had more in common with this creepy duck then I had with anyone else from my own world. I knew all about gangs, and no one was family unless you were high up in the ranks. I wasn't. No one hesitated to use me if they needed me; but they never hurried to my rescue either. It was the first time I was attacked, and no one from my gang came to save me, that I discovered I was always on my own no matter if I was solo or with a group. And it was also that time when I realized that heroes weren't, nor would ever be, real.

"My dad." I began. "He never paid much attention to me." I took a few deep breathes, trying to control my shakes. My voice was still calm though... I'm still trying to figure out how that was. "I was three when my baby sister was born. And I was six when she died." I blinked. "I was hurt by multiple peaple as well, but it was my so called mother who did the most damage. Hurt, then love, then hurt again. I'm not going into detail, but imagine a woman pretending to be a different person and forcing her daughter to do... so many things." My voice caught in my throat. "She gave me so many drugs, all that were supposed to cure me... of what I don't know. I ended up in the damn hospital and while I was in there, my little sister had no one to protect her. No one knew what my mom was and I was in no condition to tell anyone. I was in the fricken place for FIVE FUCKING MONTHS!" I had shouted the last few words without meaning to. But I was talking about this for the first time in my life. "I had promised her I wouldn't let anything hurt her and for three damned years I shielded her, took care of her. And when she needed me the most I wasn't there! I lost everything in there. I lost my sister, my sight, what little I had of my family. I ran after they let me out. There was nothing they could've done for me and they shuved me in foster care. I wasn't going to let another family hurt me. The last person to pretend to care about me just wanted to use me. And when I tried to explain about the abuse, no one cared. They all said 'that's behind you and you have to look forward'. No one CARRED! I was abused in every sense of the damned word and not one damned person got justice for me! She wasn't accused of ANYTHING, dear old dad never even bothered to visit me! I was approached by a few other blind people and I concented to going to a center where I could learn how to live independently without my site. But everyday, not even they want to be with me. Other people who I thought I would have just the smallest thing in common with didn't want to be friends or anything. I tried. But nothing. Am I that..." but Duke cut me off.

"NO!" he said fermly. "You're worth more then you know."

"How do you know?" I asked a little more sharply then intended.

"Because no one's worthless."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah." he had moved to sit next to me again. "Polly, I think you've talked enough for tonight. Why don't you calm down and try to get some more sleep." I looked at my watch, 10:25pm.

He gave me a squeeze and got up to leave. He was almost to the door when I did something I wasn't even consious of doing.

"Duke." he turned to me.

"Yes."

"Polly isn't my real name. It's Kathlene, but you can call me Kat."

"What made you think of Polly?"

"Short for Pollythimus, a giant cyclopse from..."

"Greek Mythology. Yeah, I know who he is. The one Oddyssius blinded with the burning spear."

I nodded.

"You're no cyclopse." he said, and then left.

I layed back, thinking of what he had told me. Of his life, of mine. Of how we both were subject to abuse. But he found a place where he belonged, with the rest of these guys. I thought. And when you get back home, you wont be apart of anything. There's a huge difference. It's easy for him to talk about his past, which is still your present. This was the last concious thought I had before my eye slamed shut and I fell into a heavy, almost intoxicated, slumber.

Aww... Duke you're loved! Let's hope Kathlene realizes that too. Keep reading... the next chapter is a tad long and nothing to exciting happens... well a couple of things happen but you'll have to find out what they are for yourselves. please R&R!