Wh-na…erfm…

What was this feeling? What were these… these sounds in my head? Words, I finally decided.

Confusion. Words. How did I know what these things were? How was I thinking? Was I thinking?

Blue. The large blot of color dominated my vision, hazy and undefined. After a moment, the features began to clear a little, and two smaller green blots appeared near the center of the much larger blue one.

Master. Who was this man? Why did the word 'master' register when I saw him?

A dark slash appeared beneath the green blots, curved up at a lopsided angle.

"Forgive me, little one." He murmured. His voice was deep and kind. "This will hurt for a moment, but it should give you a more manageable form."

Before the final word left his mouth (as I now registered it) fiery, seering pain melted into every corner of my consciousness. If I'd had a mouth like him, I was certain I would've been… What was the word? The action?

Screaming.

Some part of my mind counted 4.2 seconds before the pain passed, and I felt something twist inside me. My vision was still glued to his face as his smile softened and he reached out a hand to touch the side of whatever I was in. "You will be the perfect minion for my son. I have every confidence in you, little one." He told me quietly.

I began to learn, began to consciously think as time passed. Things kept twisting inside me, curling off me, wrapping around me. One moment I would feel weightless, the next, horribly constricted.

This blue-headed being continued to come and leave periodically, sometimes accompanied by a woman with a similar blue head, sometimes by a tall green creature with a terrifying face. They would drop things into the ball of water I occupied, sometimes hurting me, other times filling me with a warm, satisfied feeling. They apologized every time I felt the pain, offering me warm smiles and encouragement.

More time passed, and the terrifying green creature would come in periodically to lift my sphere and set it into a machine. Words, numbers, images, feelings would all zoom through my mind.

Minion. I was a minion, I learned. Being created to take care of a future Irridearian. My purpose was to protect this future life, to be loyal to and forever take care of it.

The blue man would come in more often than the others, reading books with colorful pictures in them to me. Tales of fiction, accounts of real battles. Histories, children's books, songs…

Sometimes the blue woman would come in, and the two would stand with their heads together, their eyes closed and sad expressions on their face as they touched the woman's growing stomach. I would hear tiny pieces of their conversation. 'Failed', 'not possible', 'doom', 'too late'. But they would turn to smile sadly at me, and press their hands against my sphere.

"You're our only hope, little one." They would tell me.

Only hope for what?

There was one day, after many months of these lessons and uncertainty that my sphere was lifted by the smiling blue man, and I was taken to a small chrome room. The blue woman lay on a bed beneath a large machine with a screen attached to the side.

Something small and grey rested in the center of the screen, eyes closed, curled into a tiny ball. It was nestled in deep cerulean half-light, and the image was blurry, as though looking through many layers of dirty glass.

"Whhhh-who-" Lips that were still only half-formed moved on what I learned was to become my face. "Whhooohht… Whoht zzzaaah… tthhhhhahat…?" I questioned.

The smiling blue man reached out to touch the screen as the blue woman smiled from the bed. "This is your future master, little one. You're our only hope our child. You're his only hope."

"Hooo… hooope?"

The blue man smiled again, this time sadly as he exchanged a quick glance with the blue woman before looking back down at me. "Yes. Hope. Our world is going to be destroyed. The gravitational pull is too strong: we can't evacuate the planet. My wife and I will die. But, our son may live." He lifted me higher until I was at his eye-level and his sad smile turned reassuring. "You and our son may live. In a pod small enough, fast enough, powerful enough to escape the pull of the black hole."

Fear fluttered through me, and I must've had eyes at this point. I felt something pulling towards the front of my consciousness, and I think I may have given the blue man a frightened look, because his smile turned sad again. "D… dyyyye?"

"Yes, little one. We weren't able to leave, not with my wife so close to giving birth. Not with our funds. We aren't important enough." He turned his eyes to his wife, and the two smiled lovingly at one another, reaching for each other's hands. I watched their fingers entwine, their smiles turning blissful as they locked eyes. "But we'll be together until the end."

The blue woman lifted her hands, reaching for me and the blue man obliged. My sphere was passed to her and she scooted up in the bed until she was sitting up. "My son deserves more than a few days of life, little one. He deserves a chance. And so do you. Will you promise to care for my son, to take care of him? Will you promise us that?" She asked in her musical voice.

"I… w-whill… p-p-prrrrromize…" I assured her. And I would. I loved these two, this man and this woman. I didn't want them to die.

They'd given me life. So I would return the favor for their child.

It was a week later, as my form finished its final phase that my master burst into his lab, snatching my sphere from the desk and sprinting with it out into the hallway. I shook fearfully in the little ball, afraid I'd done something wrong, or this black hole he'd told me about was swallowing the planet already. I tried to form a coherent enough sentence to ask him what was wrong, but it came out broken and garbled, and he ignored me, stumbling slightly as he turned a corner. He slammed through the double doors at the end of the hall, shielding me with his arms as he came to a skidding halt next to the blue woman lying in another bed, screaming.

I was terrified, and opened my mouth to ask what was going on when a weak, higher-pitched cry broke over hers.

The entire room fell silent except for this single, pitiful voice crying from somewhere near her legs. The other blue man in the room suddenly smiled softly and stood, something tiny, gray, and covered in purple and blue gore. The screaming was coming from this tiny bundle as the blue man turned and handed it to a young blue girl.

I watched, fascinated as my master set me on a nearby table before leaning over to wrap his arms around his quietly crying wife. Her tears scared me, and I turned instead to watch nervously as the tiny gray thing was cleaned off and wrapped in a soft white blanket. The young blue girl lifted the thing into her arms and carried it back to my master and mistress, setting it on the woman's belly.

They leaned in, smiling sadly down at the tiny bundle, clearly having forgotten I was there as they talked in hushed, soothing tones to the crying creature.

"Mmmmuh-mmassster?" I called quietly.

The blue man jumped slightly, turning to smile at my apologetically as he stood, retrieved me, and returned to his wife's side. "This is him, little one." He told me quietly.

My eyes widened in shock and disbelief as I looked down at the tiny gray creature. Its fists clenched tightly, waving through the air a few times before it let out a pitiful cry and once again fell silent.

"Theees… this is… my mmaaahster?" I asked.

The blue woman smiled, and shifted the child so I could see it better from the blue man's arms. "Yes. His name is Adrinel. After my great-grandfather."

"Ah… ahd… Ad… ri… nel." I repeated carefully.

She nodded. "Yes. My little Adrinel. My son." She turned, lifting her eyes to the blue man with a sad smile. "Our son."

He smiled and leaned down to first kiss her, then the baby. As I watched him, it was only then that I realized the scary green creature and the feline-like purple creature that often followed mistress around were standing in one corner of the room, gazing sadly at the tiny baby that was now my master.

I too looked down at him, and felt something warm fill my heart. Something felt as though it attached between the two of us, holding us together even as my master stood, kissed his wife and son once more before carrying my sphere away from the bed, and out of the room.

I wasn't able to see my master for eight long, increasingly nerve-wracking days. They were horrible. I tried to ask my master if I could see the child, if I could be by the child but he was rarely in the lab anymore. When he was, it was only to grab something before he ran back out again, his expression frantic.

When those eight days passed, I was sleeping in my sphere, imagining my master. How would he grow? Would he like me? Would I be a good enough minion for him?

I was jolted awake when my ball was once again snatched from the pedestal. My master was babbling incoherently at me, frightened, frazzled. Something about the star finally going super nova. Something about not enough time, last chance…

Things were falling, crumbling around us and a giant screen was flashing red with the words PANIC ever half-second. People were screaming, running around, calling for their loved ones or simply standing and staring, dead-eyed, out of the gaping hole in the roof. Waiting to die.

I was dropped next to a metal pod, bouncing slightly as my master ran off once more. I shook my head, trying to clear it as I watched him stop, grab something from my mistress, and run quickly back to the pod. He set the tiny bundle in the pod, careful as could be and I felt a brief twinge of jealousy that was gone before it ever really started.

The blue woman lifted me up and lowered me gently into the pod. "Here is your minion," she said, to the creature I was now looking at inside the pod. "He will take care of you."

That was when I recognized the face of the creature I was being handed to. It was my master! My young master, only his skin had changed to a soft blue tone, and his eyes were open, wide and green. He reached for me and I smile toothily at him, all my pain and anxiety washing away as I settled onto the seat with him.

"And here is your binky." The blue man said, handing the object to his son. My master made a gurgling sound and stuffed the object between his lips.

This was what I was destined for. To take care of this now homeless, parentless infant.

I'd promised.

I smiled warmly up at him before I turned to give his parents, my master and mistress, one last, reassuring smile.

Everything was going to be perfect. We would fly safely away from the planet, land somewhere where a nice, loving family would take us in. I would take care of my master, forever love him and stand loyally by his side, and everything would be perfect.

Or… so I thought.