So I had a burst of inspiration for once and wrote this snippet of one of my stories and I guess y’all can check it out if ya want to... if you feel like it... You don't have to though.
Under the cut...
“That’s quite the shiner you got there, Aid.”
Aiden had just barely walked into the quiet house. It was late, some time close to one in the morning, and he thought both of his parents would have been fast asleep. The sound of his dad’s voice proved him wrong. He shrugged it off. The darkening bruise under his eye didn’t mean anything. Well, it meant he got into another fight but that was pretty normal. So was the blood on his face and the various minor injuries all over his body. But the pain he felt underneath the bruise wasn’t.
“Let me take a look,” his dad said getting up from the table and walking over.
“Dad, I’m fine. It’s nothing.”
“Not nothing if you’re hiding it from me, kiddo.”
His dad grabbed him by the wrist before Aiden could leave the room. He tried to turn away but his dad wasn’t having it. Not tonight. He grabbed Aiden’s jaw firmly; forcing his son to make eye contact with. Despite his kind voice and pleasant mannerisms Ash Coleman was a force to be reckoned with when he was angry.
And he made it very clear to Aiden just how angry he was.
“Your mother was worried sick about you,” he said in a heated whisper.
He gave his son’s face a once over before letting go. Looking Aiden up and down, he scanned his son’s body for other injuries. A harsh looking burn ran across his right leg just underneath the knee. A few smaller, but deep looking, burns and cuts ran up and down his arms. Aiden even had a large bruise on the left side of his jaw. Shaking his head sadly Ash reached out and touched the bruise. Aiden flinched away in pain and grit his teeth.
“This isn’t like you, Aid, getting hurt in fights. You’ve been hanging around Orion’s kid too much. He’s messing with your head.”
“Leave Py out of it, dad! This has nothing to do with him!”
“Oh, really?” Ash responded with a raised eyebrow.
“Then tell me this, son. Why is everyone on Block F saying that you’ve been planning some sort of overthrow of Orion? With his own flesh and blood no less!”
“They don’t know what they’re talking about. And neither do you,” Aiden said his voice bitter.
“Then what is it? What’s the truth, Aid?”
But before Aiden could respond an alarm rang out.
“One followed by three followed by one,” Aiden said.
Fear ran through his voice despite his best efforts to hide how he felt. He recognized the alarm and what it meant. Everyone in Ingisetus did; they had to. In school one of the first things every child was taught was the nation’s alarms and what they meant. And every month they had nationwide alarm drills. Just to keep everyone ready, Orion said. If they were hearing it now that meant it wasn’t just ringing through their Block. It was ringing through every single Block.
This wasn’t a drill.
They were here.
The invaders didn’t come dressed in armor or laden with weapons. They didn’t need to. Soldiers of Mesmeria didn’t need those things to complete their missions. The army used their powers and got other people to do the dirty work for them. It was how they subjugated and controlled everyone else. They pit the people of Ignisetus one against another in a massive bloodbath.
Aiden could barely comprehend what was going on. Flashes of orange, red, and blue fire came at him from all sides. He could feel his body attacking his friends, his countrymen, but he couldn’t make himself stop. He felt the fire roaring through his veins and erupting out his hands. Aiden watched helplessly as he burned his people alive.
Suddenly he heard a voice in his head yell.
“Stop!”
Everyone in the city square stopped immediately. Frozen in place they all stopped fighting. All who were still left alive.
A man stepped out from the crowd of soldiers. He was tall, tan, and had the brightest blue eyes. His clothes were deep purple and black. His dark brown hair was long and cascaded down his to shoulders from underneath his crown. The crown was black with a gold inlay around the brim and laden with green emeralds. He had a short beard sprinkled with a few grays. Small semblances of crow’s feet tugged at the edges of his eyes and a few freckles dotted his face.
“Kneel before me,” he said.
As the people around him immediately obeyed Aiden struggled against himself.
“It seems we have a rebel, Father,” a small feminine voice said from somewhere in the crowd.
“It seems so.”
Aiden stood his ground as best he could as the man and the girl walked towards him. The girl wore a deep, almost blood, red dress with black stockings and black heels. Her hair was the same deep brown as her father’s and she also had a few freckles on her face. She looked like a smaller female version of her father. The main difference between the two of them was her eyes were a light shade of brown. She looked out and above Aiden and the others around him. It seemed that she didn’t want to make eye contact with anyone.
But when the pair approached him the girl flashed Aiden a look of sadness and regret.
Just as quickly as he saw that look her expression changed to a vile smirk. She looked Aiden up and down, examining the burns and bruises along his body, just like dad had done only hours ago. But the way this girl eyed him was far different. She didn’t look at the bruise on his face with concern or disappointed. She looked at him with appraisal as if she were judging if he would be fit for something. She huffed slightly before giving a short and precise nod.
“Come with us,” she said.
He didn’t move.
It was obvious to both the girl and the man that he was resisting their power. It was a struggle that Aiden desperately needed to win.
“You belong to House Aldridge now,” the girl said her voice turning colder.
“My father, mother, and I are your masters. Now! Come!”
Aiden tried his best to resist. He really did. But his body just wouldn’t listen to him anymore. His face grimaced as he mentally fought with himself. Nevertheless his legs disobeyed his mind and he rose to feet. Aiden reluctantly followed the girl and her father as they walked back to the crowd of soldiers.
He stared at the ground, disappointed in himself, as he trailed behind them.
Just as they were about to regroup with the soldiers he something on the ground caught his eye.
He recognized the faces instantly. His mom and dad lay on the ground facing each other. They both wore identical masks of anger and hatred. But he saw their true feelings for one another in the tears that ran down their cheeks. He saw their undying love for each other in the way they held hands even in death. Despite the power of the soldiers they couldn’t fight each other. They would rather die together than die fighting against each other.
Tears ran down his face as he was forced to turn away from them and follow his new “masters”.
He never got to tell his dad the truth.
He wasn’t just hanging out with Pyrrhus. They weren’t just plotting to overthrow his father. They were more than best friends. Much, much, more. Aiden never found the courage to tell them before. He and his parents had a lot of fights surrounding Pyrrhus Orion already. Aiden didn’t want to add to the distrust and bad blood between his parents and Py. Most were about how the boy was a bad influence on Aiden. Or that he was going to get Aiden in a lot of trouble one day.
The pair would often laugh about how wrong his parents had it.
Aiden was the rebel and the troublemaker.
Pyrrhus on the other hand was always the good boy.
The boy Aiden had grown up alongside since birth. The young boy who was forced to live a life that wasn’t his. The young boy who lived under the highest expectations just because who his father was. The boy who had a fire inside that was deeper than anyone else’s and with visions to match. The boy with pale skin, freckles that ran across his back, and bright orange hair. The boy with the dazzling smile and the musical laugh.
The boy he loved and who loved him back.
They had grown so far apart and yet so close.
Aiden vowed that he would figure out a way to escape the clutches of the Aldridge family. He also knew that he had to find a way to do so before they made it to Mesmeria. Once they were there Aiden would be as good as dead. He had to escape and soon. He had to. Not just for himself but for Py and everyone who was left. Aiden was smart enough to know that Aldridge and his army murdered Orion before they came for the rest of them. He just hoped that wherever Pyrrhus was that he was okay.
That he was safe.
That he would protect their people.