Young Writers Society

Morning light shone through the slats of the blinds, falling on the reddish gaze of Mattathias Jermaine as he stared at the monotone ceiling. He'd gotten his own place the week before and moved out from his father's apartment. He hadn't though it'd change much. After all, he was finally home--no one was hunting him or trying to kill him.

Still, he found it hard to sleep alone. He woke up in the middle of the night covered in sweat and found himself ready to move long before the sun came up. It seemed that his time as Nerezzar had had more influence than he'd thought. The draconian was naturally more nocturnal or crepuscular, avoiding work towards the middle of the day and going out at night. It was why, despite being a reptile, he was endothermic, more like a bird. Unfortunately, he wasn't a draconian anymore. He was a human. On Earth.

Home.

For so long that'd seemed like the answer, but the more he was here, the less it felt like it. All he'd wanted was to come back. To go to school, to draw and play World of Warcraft in his free time, to get a cat and just...live. Now, he found himself restless. He was more physically inclined than he'd ever been and day to day life was more challenging than he could've imagined. It was almost too much--the noise, the lights, the people, all of it. The only time he really felt at peace without the last seven years haunting him was when he was working out. When he couldn't focus on anything else, because his movement required all his focus, in body and in mind.

He sighed and rose, going to his closet and grabbing a black tank top with the symbol of the Horde in red on the front of it and pulling it on before grabbing gray sweat shorts and heading into the bathroom. His visage was still strange to him. He'd been back on Earth for almost eight months now, but the eyes looking back at him were the only thing that seemed remotely familiar. The fair skin, dark hair, and lanky, scaleless body was something he wasn't used to, and the adjustment to losing two appendages--his wings--was bizarre. He missed that, too. The flying.

It wasn't long before he was scooping his iPod up and shrugging a sweater on. He'd hit the gym and work out until he couldn't anymore, then he'd find some way to kill time. It was the weekend and his homework was done so he had time to do whatever he wanted, really.

The Heartless came at him in a relentless surge. He swung his keyblade about - desperate - but more kept appearing in the place of the ones he had defeated. He was starting to run out of stamina, and his wrist was beginning to ache.

He knocked another one back with a slash of his keyblade, sending its heart up into the sky as he tried to fight back the rest of its kin. They swiped and clawed at him, but he was able to hold his ground.

He just wasn't sure for how long.

There was a brief lull in the attacks. The Heartless were quickly coming closer, but he had just enough time to form a corridor of darkness. He darted through the portal, leaving behind the hordes of Heartless for a world and a man that looked incredibly unfamiliar.

The corridor closed behind him.

He stared at the man - who was terrifyingly taller than him - with one gold and one green eye, his lips quivering underneath the safety of the cloth covering his mouth.

He held up his keyblade, struggling to ignore the very, very strong urge to let his hand and keyblade shake.

There was a flicker of movement, and he turned to come face-to-face with a man who was nearly as large as he was.

Had it been any other time in his life, he would've merely asked what he was doing there or shrieked and run away. Instead of doing either of these things, however, he threw his leg out and hooked it under the golden-eyed fellow's ankles, sweeping him off his feet and throwing his keyblade to the ground along with him. In moments he was on top of the stranger with his knee to the man's throat and his fingers clasped tightly around his wrists.

"Who are you and what the hell do you want?" he demanded, his voice a low snarl. The lights flickered and his eyes flashed a brilliant crimson, the pupils elongating into draconian slits.

His lips opened in a helpless imitation of a startled cry as he was swept off of his feet, but he kept his grip strong on his keyblade. He didn't know who this man was. He didn't even know where he was. But his keyblade was supposed to fight foes, and if this man was one-

The man spoke.

And as he spoke, the lights flickered and his eyes flashed crimson. They didn't look natural - didn't look right. His eyes widened in alarm, and he started to struggle against the man's grip. His keyblade waved about wildly in the air as he tried to get free. Though his hands could do nothing, his keyblade was easily able to reach his captor's face...

...waking him in the face as Kirux continued to struggle.

An idea suddenly came to him, remembering what Winnie had told him to do in a situation like this.

His knee shot up and hit the man right in the crotch.

In all the years of fighting for his life, that was one trick that had never quite worked--after all, draconians were reptiles, and it didn't have the same affect--but now he was human. He let out a yelp of pain and hit the ground, the lights flickering one, last time before the room was thrown into pitch darkness.

He scrambled to his feet in the blackness. His eyes adjusted quickly, more quickly than any human's should've, and the pale light from outside glinted off the back of his eyes like a wild animal's in the moonlight. The man himself was largely oblivious to what was happening. To him, this was normal, and in the instinctual state of mind that the fight had thrown him into, he failed to recognize that this shouldn't be happening now that he wasn't Nerezzar.

The room had gone dark. Memories flickered through Kirux's mind - memories of not being able to sleep because he was scared of the monsters underneath his bed, of his mom plugging in a nightlight to illuminate the room in gentle glows, and of Winnie leading him to her room and saying that he could sleep in her bed for that night - as he struggled to find some kind of light source.

He stumbled around in the darkness, swinging his keyblade about in shaking hands as he tried to fend off the attack he knew was coming. His vision was beginning to grow blurry with tears. He took a step forward and found himself walking into something.

For a moment, he hoped it was just a random piece of furniture.

But then he felt how warm it was, and how it felt like a person just a little bit taller than him.

He slowly looked up at the two reptilian eyes in the darkness.

He should've stopped, then, and realized that this man was no threat. He should've recognized that the strange figure was just as afraid as he was. He should've left him alone.

But there was still a predator there, inside of him: an assassin, a survivor, a fighter, a killer, and in that moment, he was more dragon than he was human. He grabbed the other figure, wrapping his left arm around his back to take control and wrapping the fingers of his right hand around his throat, teeth bared in a feral snarl. This time, his thigh was shoved against the knee of his opponent to block any more potential crotch kickings. He leaned in close, his nose nearly brushing that of the golden-eyed man's.

"I'll ask you one more time," he growled, fingers tightening. "What do you want?"

There was nothing more terrifying than being mute in a situation that demanded a voice.

His keyblade slipped out of his hand and clattered to the ground as he continued to stare in the eyes of his captor. This was it. This was how he was going to die. He was going to fade like Lea said he would - he would be nothing more than a memory in the minds of the people who had met him along his journey, and they wouldn't even know where he died.

His lips quivered even more - now noticeable underneath the cloth covering his mouth - and his vision was entirely blurred by the tears now quickly streaming down his cheeks. Some rolled down the black fabric of his mask, hitting the hand that was wrapped around his neck.

His body heaved as a silent sob left him.

Something was wrong.

He didn't know what, but this wasn't how things were supposed to go. It was different, somehow, strange. An oddity--and Nerezzar wasn't used to oddities. The draconian eyes of Mattathias Jermaine narrowed and he leaned in, studying the countenance of his now-prisoner.

He was crying. Sobbing. And not in the silent, composed way anyone who'd attack him would be. He wasn't begging, either, and that was more than bizarre considering the circumstances. The lights flickered and came back on as he slowly released the man, stepping back. "What's going on here? What is it you want?" he repeated, this time more calmly, though his heart was still beating a million miles an hour.

Even as light flooded the room and his captor let go, tears still flowed down his cheeks. He raised a trembling hand up to his mask. Pulling it down, he tried to mouth a response - but the words just weren't clear. His lips were shaking too much, and his face was moving too much with each silent sob.

He backed up into something. He spun around and stared down, discovering that he had just bumped into a bed. After a moment passed, he sat down and grabbed onto a nearby pillow. He held it close to his chest, hiding the majority of his face behind it - the only visible part of it were his green and golden eye. He should have just made a corridor of darkness, but he was tired after only just making one. He didn't think he could muster one even if he tried.

He watched silently as the sobbing figure sat down, seizing a pillow and holding it close as tears rolled down his face. This wasn't a killer--or, at least, not one who'd been sent to take his life. So who was this, then? Why were they here? And what in the hell was wrong with their voice? Couldn't they speak?

Matt slowly sat down next to him, his eyes returning to normal, though he was oblivious to the fact they'd changed in the first place. "It's alright, I'm not going to hurt you," he said softly. "Sorry about that, I...You scared me."

He flinched as the bed creaked under the man's weight, but his posture relaxed once the man started speaking and his eyes turned back to normal. His hands shook - their movements were hesitant and unsteady. But he still was able to sign a little reply, even though he doubted the man would understand what he was saying.

"You scared me, too," he nervously signed.

He raised his head a little, resting his chin on the top of the pillow instead of hiding the lower half of his face behind it.

So he really couldn't speak. Matt knew enough to recognize the sign language, even if he didn't fully understand it. He had, however, taken it in high school and been forced to memorize the alphabet. It'd be slow but at least they could communicate.

"I...I don't know much more than the alphabet, sorry," he apologized. "Uh...I'm Matt, by the way. What's your name?"

He immediately perked up. Even knowing the alphabet was better knowing than knowing nothing in sign language! He didn't know how hard it would be to spell everything out, but little words were definitely easy to take care of.

His name was a good start.

"K-I-R-U-X," he signed, his movements slow and steady. He pointed at himself as he completed the "x", just in case his name was an unusual one for wherever he was. He gave him a small smile.

Then an idea struck him, and he tried to convey another message. "M-A-T-T," he spelled out, pointing at him before giving a thumbs up. He wasn't sure the meaning fully got across, but he wanted to try to let Matt know that he liked his name.

He thought for another moment, letting his face sink a little into the pillow.

He held out his hand like it was a flat piece of paper, and mimed writing on it with an imaginary pencil in his right hand. Then he looked back up at Matt, tilting his head slightly to the side in query.