And a sequel
Disclaimer: Ward belongs to Marvel™; the other characters are actually mine.
Several months pass ever since Grant has been sent to a military school, and he has already figured something about himself – and the others: he is unhappy. It is not a state of mind that is unknown to him – he has been profoundly unhappy at home – but now, in the military school, this misery has reached new levels, levels that he did not know that he had.
It is not fair! Grant wails to himself in his mind. He did not ask for this! He did his best to make his father proud of him – and just because he will not outdo Christian, it is no reason to turn on him so badly, as if he was some sort of a reject, now is it? Surely father didn't mean that when he said that Grant did not make the cut? He worked so hard to please-
...No, no he did not. He could've done precisely what his father has done, followed it to the letter – and his father's orders don't leave a lot to the imagination, now do they? Grant should've followed, instead of outright balking-
Grant blinks. Where did these thoughts come from? Yes, father is father, but-
Grant shakes his head, trying to clear out his thoughts and to get a bead – a piece of military lingo that he had already picked up in the academy – on something that he saw (or thought that he did). Something that was a shadow (the military academy is a rather shadowy place, in a strange way), but somehow not quite like the other shadows in the detention hall of the already-mentioned academy. Being a shadow in a place of shadows it does an admirable job of trying to blend in – and to somehow persuade Grant that it is not there at all – but Grant is stubborn, and alone, and doesn't really have anything else to do – other than to work-off his detention, but that can wait – and so he soon can make it out a shape that is essentially your textbook version of a devil or a demon, complete with leathery wings and curved horns – and all of it is made from a shadow.
"So you saw me out, kid, congratulations," the demon rasps, sounding a good deal less than congratulatory. "Now what?"
"Nothing!" Grant shrugs: now that the euphoria of the hunt is over, he is back to being morose – if he would not be so curious: "Who are you and why are you here?"
"My name is Leon," the demon grumbles, "and I live here." He pauses and thinks things over. "And your name is Grant, Grant Ward, isn't it?"
"Yes. How did you know?" Grant asks, surprised – he never thought that he would be important enough for demons to know his name.
"Oh, I've been sent to live here until I meet you," Leon shrugs. "Your little stunt with the cat had caught the eye of some very important people!" he continues unabashedly.
"Really?" Grant perks-up: father had told him (and Christian) that being noticed by important people was, well, important (a bit of a repetition, but Mr Ward Sr. tends to repeat himself a lot, being an important man himself). "Cool!"
"Yeah, normally, but not in this case," Leon shakes his head. "You've been noticed for all the wrong reasons, see?"
"Oh," Grant deflates.
"You shouldn't have touched the cat, and followed the old geezer's suggestion," Leon continues.
"Oh," Grant deflates even further. "Well, why that there in the first place if I wasn't to touch it?" he brings up his old excuse: his parents were not impressed by it, but Leon's reaction is somewhat different:
"Because someone in the supply had messed up!" he snapped. "Blood mass productions – yeah, they're good, but they're not the solution for everything, either-" he visibly checks himself and turns back to Grant. "Where was I?"
"The mass productions?" Grant cannot help but to make a 'helpful' suggestion. His parents were not amused when he did it; Leon's reaction is somewhat different:
"Nice try, kid...that is actually a good place to start. Yes, someone has messed-up in the mass production and supply field, and the cat in question...ended up in the wrong place at the wrong time – in the shop that you and your ma went to visit. The old man, who ran the shop...he was in the know, I was told, but apparently he had paid for that privilege with his brain, since he had mismanaged the situation completely-" he visibly checks himself and turns back to Grant. "Where was I?"
By now Grant feels about as lost as Leon claims to be, so he shrugs:
"The old man?" he suggests. "The cat? His brain?"
"Yeah, yeah, yeah, that. Someone else has messed up, the old geezer has messed-up, and you have messed up by touching the cat, as I told you. However, you have messed-up only because of what the other people did, so I was sent here to wait for you and to fix you-"
"Fix me? Why?" Grant asks his interlocutor. "It was only a toy cat – you're an actual demon. Why would you be sent to fix up anyone, let alone me?"
"Well, kid," and Leon here primed just a little, "your family is very well known and important in my circles. Your run-in with the damn cat was a mistake, so I was sent here to fix you, free of charge. Just sit still and let me fix your story – at this moment in time and space it's easy-"
"My story," Grant moves away slightly. "What do you mean?"
"Nothing – you should be like the other men in your family, that is all-"
"No!" Grant snaps, for Leon has said the magic word – the 'wrong' magic word. "I won't be like them, I won't!"
"Kid, you have no choice-"
"Yes, he does," says the new arrival, instead. Like Leon, it is dark in color, but unlike Leon, it is not a demon – more of a cougar or a mountain lion in Grant's opinion (not that he had many experiences with such creatures). "Demon, he promptly refused your offer, so be gone from him, or be ready to fight."
"Fight? You and me?" Leon chuckles, not sounding very afraid. "I, who walks where angels fear to tread, fight you? And for what? A marked card?" He pauses, sees that the panther is not very impressed with him, and continues, in a less cocky tone. "Besides, the kid is clearly unhappy with the choice that he'd made – I'm actually doing him a favor!"
"No you're not!" Grant yells automatically, before taking a pause. "Are you?"
"Listen kid," while Leon is obviously male, the panther's gender is...harder to pin down – not that Grant cares about this, in all of the new excitement, "I must admit that Leon here's got a point – you do have choices."
"I do?" Grant's excitement grows by the minute – no one has ever given him a choice before, it always was the Ward family way. "What are they?"
The big cat rolls its eyes. "You can let Leon fix you and put you back in the world you belong – or should've belonged – if you hadn't released my cousin accidentally-"
"She's ok?" Grant asks, remembering the little metal cat that had started all of this.
"My cousin – that cousin – is a he, actually," the panther says wryly, "but yes, he's much better now, much happier now, and he wants me to thank you for doing that. Hence why I am here, in your corner, since no one else would be, on behalf of you being a Ward."
"Then I am keeping it," Grant turns back to Leon. "I won't have you make the cat cousin unhappy once more. It's wrong."
"And there you have it," the panther turns back to Leon. "He has made his choice. Be gone."
"So be it," Leon does not look happy, but his facial expression is weird. "It is his call – he wants to be miserable here, not fitting in with his own destiny – so be it." And with that parting shot he is gone.
"What Leon was talking about?" Grant is honestly confused as he asks the panther, which is also vanishing.
"Kid, you've got two choices, basically," the panther shrugs, even as it is vanishing into the shadows. "You can continue as you were...and end up rather like my cousin had, actually, before he ran into you in that shop or you can change your world by changing yourself. Toughen up, kid... but in the end, it's your call, really," and it is gone too.
Grant thinks about it. He is not sure that if he had done the right thing by refusing Leon's offer, but it is his thing, not his family's, and so he is sticking to it – in fact, he swears that from now on he will be making his own choices, not anyone else's (and he is going to stick to it – following John Garrett in the future will be his own choice, and no one else's, to the sorrow of many people), and right now? He is making his new decision of his own – to dominate this military school and to make all those people, staff and students, who have mocked him – regret it. He is not sure how to, but since they seem to value physical prowess here a lot – he will go for that route. (And he does – by the time that he has to leave the academy he is one of their most impressive students...and one of the most anti-social ones.) He has a long way to travel yet, in a direction that he knows nothing about (it will take him through Heaven and Hell, darkness and light), but it will be his journey – not his family's. His own. He doesn't know any more than this about his new plan, but it's good enough for him all the same – and it's a start...or rather the sequel to what has begun back in that knick-knack shop.
End