Monster
A/N: Sometimes, an idea just materialises in my brain and refuses to leave me alone until I do something about it. This was one of those times. Happy reading!
He hadn't meant to hurt anyone. He really hadn't.
He'd only wanted to join in with the other kids and their game. It looked like they were having fun. Was it so bad that he wanted to play as well? To be one of them? To be normal like them? To run and laugh and just be a kid like any other?
He hadn't meant to hurt them. He really hadn't.
The boy's leg was ruined. Bent unnaturally in multiple places, off-white bone poking out from one spot where the break was most pronounced. And the blood… so much blood pooling all around…
He didn't mean to hurt him. He really didn't.
The screaming hurt to listen to, and the sight of all that blood made him feel sick. But he couldn't look away, couldn't cover his ears to block it all out. He was frozen, eyes wide as he stared at the results.
A lot of the shouting was aimed at him, he realised after some time. And one word in particular was able to pierce the fog of shock and panic that had settled over his brain, stabbing into his mind. That word he had heard aimed his way so often, for one reason or another, and it felt so much more potent now.
Monster.
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He was back in the lab. Back in his cell. He could never call it his room. It didn't feel like that to him. It wasn't his own space, after all, just somewhere he could be kept while the scientists ran their tests and made their notes and observations.
One of the scientists was speaking to him. Informing him of their decision. No more unsupervised outings, they said. No more interactions with the other children, they said. They couldn't afford another incident like this one, they said. Parents would have too many questions, they said.
He nodded. He said he understood.
He asked if the boy would be OK. Or at least, he tried to ask. But the scientist cut him off, moving onto other things as soon as he had agreed with the new arrangements. Now they were telling him what tomorrow's experiments would be. They were moving up to the next calibre of round in the live-fire tests, and then they would be increasing the height of the drop test by another fifty metres. After that would be his lessons. Maths, physics, and all the other ones.
He nodded along to each thing the scientist said, like always. It was… easier. To just go along with what he was told. He didn't have to think too hard about it if it was what he was told to do. He didn't have to dwell on anything if he was just doing what he was asked.
The scientist left as soon as they were done speaking. Dinner came a little while later, delivered to him without a word.
He went to bed soon after, and as he turned out the light and settled in, he hoped he wouldn't have any dreams.
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He dreamt of blood and of screams. He dreamt of people's faces looking at him in anger, in fear. He dreamt of that word, the word they all used, the word he heard so often that it may as well have been his name.
Monster.
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The man at his feet looked up at him, eyes wide and pleading as he frantically and desperately tried to bargain for his life.
He looked down at the man, and with a huff and a sneer he turned and walked away.
Yet another idiot who thought they could challenge him for his position at the top of the mountain. He had long since stopped keeping count, but he was fairly certain the number had to be in the hundreds by now. And yet, they never seemed to learn. If anything, they just seemed to grow more determined every time he beat one of them down.
He was getting tired of it.
He had his freedom now. A place that he could well and truly call his own, and not just a cell in a lab somewhere. He could go where he pleased without anyone hovering nearby. The scientists had lost interest in him once they had learnt all they could from his power, and after that they had had no reason to keep him around.
It had been wonderful at first, but now it was tedious. He had had to move so often in the last year alone that he had started keeping a go-bag ready for when he inevitably needed to relocate after someone broke in to wait for him in his own home for a fight.
What would it take to get them to leave him alone?
What would it take to get them to stop throwing themselves at him and getting hurt?
A voice called out to him. He turned, and rolled his eyes as yet another idiot issued yet another grandiose challenge to him, brandishing a length of pipe as they charged in for yet another humiliating beatdown.
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He dreamt of violence and hate. He dreamt of a parade of challenges, all ending the same way. He dreamt of that word, the same word as always, thrown his way at the end of every fight.
Monster.
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Why did he agree to this?
Why did he go along with this madness?
Why? Why? Why?
Because it was easier, wasn't it? To just go along with what he was told. He didn't have to think too hard about it if it was what he was told to do. He didn't have to dwell on anything if he was just doing what he was asked.
But there was more to it this time. This time, somewhere amidst all this blood and death and horror, there was that little spark of hope.
Because maybe, if he finally became so untouchable, so unthinkably strong that no-one would even consider attacking him ever again, then maybe… just maybe…
Just maybe…
He walked away from the scene of the latest test, leaving the mess behind to be cleared away by the rest of the wind-up dolls.
He ignored the fact that they had human faces and human voices. He ignored the questions in his own head, the unease and the discomfort. He ignored the side of himself that said this was wrong, this was so wrong, that he had to stop before…
All of it, he pushed down and buried as low as he could.
It wouldn't matter in the end, anyway. When he finally had what he was promised, when he was finally truly untouchable, then all of this wouldn't matter anymore.
He could finally stop, but only when he reached the end.
No turning back on this one-way road.
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He dreamt of rage and grief. He dreamt of the sound of her anguish as she threw herself at him, hatred twisting her face. He dreamt of that fire vanishing from her eyes as she realised who he truly was, and even though she did not say it out loud, he knew that she had thought it, that word that described who he was to his core.
Monster.
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"Get the hell away from Misaka's little sister, Third-String!"
Well, that was a new one.
In all his time, in all those years, no-one had ever called him anything like that before.
Who did this guy think he was? What was his angle? Was he trying to piss him off? Well, mission accomplished if that was the case. Yeah, he was feeling pretty pissed off, but whatever. This guy wasn't anything special. No different from all the other idiots who thought they could reach him. Just like all of them, this would end the same.
No different… no… no, this was different.
His eyes were different. The way he spoke was different. The way he fought, moved and dodged and-
Hit him. He hit him. He could touch him!
Over and over and over again. Blow after blow after furious, heavy blow. A punch that jolted his arm aside, a punch that drove the wind from his lungs, a punch that rattled his skull and sent the whole world spinning on its axis…
"Why the hell should they have to die for someone like you!?"
Die…? They weren't even alive in the first place! Wind-up dolls, every single one. Every time he tried to talk with them, to ask them what they thought, they always gave him the same result, the same soulless answers spat out by their pre-programmed computer brains…
He'd ignored the fact that they'd had human faces and human voices. He'd ignored the questions in his own head, the unease and the discomfort. He'd ignored the side of himself that said this was wrong, this was so wrong, that he had to stop…
He'd ignored it all for so long, and now this Third-String… this Hero… was digging it all back up.
No… No… No… No… No!
No turning away! No stopping until the end! No way back on this one-way road!
He just needed more power. Power to silence this voice. Power to drive back anyone and anything that dared to try and reach him.
Flat on his back, pain throbbing all over his battered form, he raised his hand and pushed himself to his limits. The calculations whirred in his mind, his voice came out a garbled mess as he frantically grasped outwards, grabbed at the means to surpass them all for good.
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He dreamt of pain and failure. He dreamt of storm clouds parting, driven back by a power he could never have, could never call his own. He dreamt of the Hero felling the Villain, the day saved, the evil vanquished and banished to the darkness where it… where he belonged.
Monster.
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"If Misaka had said she didn't want to fight anymore, what would you do? Misaka Misaka muses on a potential from the past."
That brat… putting stupid notions in his head, then falling asleep and leaving him to pick up the bill.
What was the point? Musing on the past? There wasn't any point. The past is the past. It can't be changed, or returned to, or learnt from.
There's no way back on a one-way road.
Nothing will undo what he did. Nothing will bring back the ones he killed, or make it right. And hell, it was all for nothing anyway. All his power, all his illusions of being untouchable, of being invincible…
He had destroyed them all.
The Hero.
No fixing what he broke. No redemption for his crimes. No way back for this villain, no matter what he did.
No way back on this one-way road.
So what else could he do, but keep on walking ahead?
Besides, it was his road he walked. Even if there was no way back, he could decide where it lead from here on out.
The lab was a little further ahead.
This much… he could do this much, at least.
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His dreams were fragmented and broken. Flashes of memory from years gone by, jumbled and mixed together with pain and blood. Gaps, things missing that he knew he should still have, but no idea what they were… but amidst it all, a word that he could never forget.
Monster.
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Kihara. Kihara. Kihara. Kihara. Kihara!
Hate was not something he really felt towards anything or anyone. He felt anger, frustration, distaste and dislike, but not hate.
But for Kihara… for Kihara, he felt nothing but hate.
Hate for the one who found him. Hate for the one who raised him… for a given value of raised. Hate for the one who made him what he is, for taking him and turning him into this…
Hate… for taking away the one thing left that was good in his world. For spitting in the face of everything he was trying to do for that girl who he had taken so much from already.
He hated him. Hated him so much…
Almost as much as he hated himself.
But his hatred didn't matter. Nothing mattered while she was in danger. Until he could find her, get her away from him before he made her into another one of his tools, all of his hatred was worthless.
He had to get her back. He had to get her to safety.
So for her sake, he would embrace what they all called him. Live up to their expectations and their nightmares and become the thing they spoke of in whispers and in screams of terror. He would play the part to perfection, laughing and revelling in all he left in his wake, so as to turn that word into a weapon of his own, to wield like a second power.
Monster.
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He dreamt of losing her. He dreamt of her getting taken away, watching as she vanished and left him alone. He dreamt of them all, all turning their backs on him in disgust, turning away and leaving him all alone like he deserved, and that word being the last thing he ever heard them say.
Monster.
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It was no dream. It was real. Right before his eyes. The blood, so much blood, and the taunting words of the one who did it echoing in his ears.
"You can't protect anyone!"
All he could hear after that was his own screams. All he could see after that was the red, all red, everything red and soaked in blood as he screamed and screamed and screamed…
All his fault. He had failed. He hadn't changed. How could he ever change? Who did he think he was? A Hero, like him?
He was no Hero. He knew what he was.
He crushed the one who did it, reduced them to a stain on the ground, tore them apart and left them for dead… and it didn't matter, because nothing he did could ever matter, never make a real difference, never make up for what he did, for what he was at his core…
She was here. She had found him, stood in front of him and spoke to him, and somehow it reached him, reached him inside his spiralling mind, pulled him out and pulled him back to Earth.
He was tired… so tired… so… tired…
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He dreamt of black wings and of words he knew and yet did not know. He dreamt of soaring through the sky, and of falling in the dark. He dreamt of someone reaching out to him, offering a hand, and he wanted to take it, but knew he did not deserve to, because even if this person saw him as something worth saving, he knew better.
Monster.
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The sky above him was blue, and the snow beneath him was white. Soft… he felt it as he lay where he had fallen, felt the cold seep into his body and numb the ache he felt from all the blows he had taken.
He lost. He had lost again, to the same one as before, no less.
He had never felt happier to have lost.
He… he had wanted to defend her. Had wanted to defend her no matter what. So he had rushed headlong down the path he could choose… the path of evil. He was good at it. He got very good at being evil. But… the one who never even considered such things… who never stopped to question whether what he was doing was good or evil… it turned out that He was the strongest one after all.
There was no way back on this one-way road… but he had let the road behind him direct the road ahead. He had been looking back, unable to look forward, blind to what could be because he was so fixated on what was.
Monster…
He never called him that. Not once. Not even when they had been trying to kill each other, all that time ago when they first crossed paths.
She never called him that. Not once. Not even after everything he had done to her and to her family.
That word… so familiar it may as well have been his name…
It was something from his past.
And his past was behind him.
No way back on this one-way road.
His One-Way Road.
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This was no dream. She was safe. Last Order was safe, safe in his arms and not in pain, not in danger, not being taken away or running away or any of the dozen nightmares he had endured for so long.
But he had to leave her. He couldn't stay, not while there was still one more thing he had to do. One last thing to make sure she would stay safe.
"Please, don't!" She reaches out for him as he pulls away from the hug. "Misaka Misaka wants to be with you forever!"
And he can say it now. He can say it, and feel he deserves to say it, deserves to feel this way.
"I wanted to be with you forever, too."
Accelerator flew on wings of white, and whereas so many times before he had called on this power out of anger and rage, used this power for bloodshed and death, this time he called on his power for something more.
I get it… this is what it means to fight to protect…
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He dreamt of her smile. He dreamt of his home, of the people he had left behind. He dreamt of… Him, of the words shared and the lessons learned and the things left unsaid between them. He dreamt of all this and more, but not of that word. Not this time.
Monster… no more.
Hello all! If you're new here, it's nice to have you around! And if you're a regular here, it's good to be back! I'm Not Scot.
So… yeah. This idea just kinda came to me out of the blue while I was battling the writer's block with my other stuff, and I decided to run with it. Glad I did, because now the writing bug has well and truly gotten a hold of me again, and I'm feeling back in the swing of things and ready to get right back to work! Not to mention that a few more ideas for Toaru fics are now rattling about in my head…
The next arc of 'RWBY Re:Mixed' is on the way, I promise. I know it's been a fair bit, but it will be arriving soon, I swear! As for the other stuff… I'll get to it eventually.
In any case, let me know what you thought of this one in the reviews if you feel so inclined. But for now, I need to get back to work on the aforementioned RWBY fic, so I shall now take my leave.
Until next time,
Not Scot.
P.S: No, I still haven't started New Testament yet.